


spinning in circles (hoping one day i face you)

by wolfchester



Category: Outer Banks (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, So Much Friendship, Unplanned Pregnancy, friends to lovers to best friends who are having a baby together to dorks in love for real, jj taking care of kie and vice versa, sexual content (not explicit)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-06
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:35:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 17
Words: 94,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24030661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wolfchester/pseuds/wolfchester
Summary: pope goes to college. so does sarah cameron. john b follows his girlfriend to charleston. kie, planning on travelling to thailand next summer but needing to work her ass off at her dad’s restaurant beforehand, stays behind. jj, constant in all the most unexpected ways, stays too.they’ve got too much time on their hands and not enough supervision.things are bound to get messy.(aka the jj and kiara unplanned pregnancy fic absolutely no one asked for)
Relationships: JJ & Kiara & Pope & John B. Routledge & Sarah Cameron, JJ/Kiara (Outer Banks), Sarah Cameron & Kiara, Sarah Cameron/John B. Routledge, also specifically, but on the side like a salad dressing
Comments: 725
Kudos: 1121
Collections: Jiara Ocean Kiss Soulmate Endgame Excellence (aka a jiara-centric fic collection)





	1. prologue: those who leave, those who stay behind

**Author's Note:**

> this idea came to me after reading vi's dad!jj headcanon and .......... well......... now i have 16 chapters plotted and i think i hate myself (also seeing as i have a MILLIOn other wip's in so many fandoms holy shit)
> 
> but also ........ so excited. this is gonna be fun. 
> 
> the title of this fic comes from jonah yano's song 'shoes' feat. his dad tatsuya muraoka it's so beautiful pls listen it's all about their complicated father-son relationship and half of it is in japanese and is based on a song his dad wrote in the 90s about buying his son a pair of shoes and sending them to america and let me tell you i CRIED watching the music video. anyway,,,
> 
> also you can read vi's amazing headcanon here: https://theouterbankpogues.tumblr.com/post/616381367059677184/a-soft-hc-series-of-jj-as-a-father-p1

For all the hype surrounding high school graduation, life after really isn’t all that great, especially if you don’t plan on going to college. 

The summer after graduation is awesome, of course. Everyone’s eighteen or turning it and while you still can’t legally buy alcohol, you’re definitely making less cringey decisions than you were at sixteen. You’re a legal adult, your body stops looking so gangly and awkward and out of proportion, and sex is something almost everyone’s taking part in without any of the shameful school hallway whispering. You’re expected to start paying your own way in the world, but at least your parents stop setting curfews, so if you want to spend all night hotboxing some kid’s beat up Toyota Corolla while passionately discussing the use of symbolism in Avatar: The Last Airbender, you can. The summer after graduation is all parties and suntanning and making out with strangers, doing everything possible to avoid thinking about what’s going to happen come September.

For Kiara, JJ, John B, Pope and Sarah, the summer after graduation is a bittersweet one. Those that are leaving take little mental polaroids of every Outer Banks sunset and those that are staying try to memorise the sound of laughter to remember on nights when the town is quiet and so is the phone.

Pope gets accepted into Forensic Pathology at the University of South Florida. Sure, he’d totally blown any chances of getting that scholarship in junior year, but there were always other financial aid plans to apply for. Especially when those scholarships came offered by the _Denmark Tanney Trust Fund_ and amounted to exactly half the price of one gold bar.

Yeah, they’d each kept hold of one gold bar each after being forced to turn the whole haul in to the police after John B and Sarah got back from the Bahamas. He doesn’t like lying to his parents, but he _does_ like having his own dorm room. 

The gold was how Sarah Cameron could afford to pay tuition to study English Literature at the University of South Carolina. She had finally testified against her father and brother after coming home from her three-month-long jaunt on the beach with John B, and Ward and Rafe had been arrested on charges of second-degree murder and sentenced to fifteen years in prison. Because family relationships are super fucking complicated, Sarah visits them at least once every couple of months, and goes back home to Tanneyhill to visit Rose and Wheezie every fortnight.

In the meantime, Sarah and John B live at the Chateau which — with upgrades made possible by melting down part of John B’s gold bar — now has cable, running water, and a heated towel rack in the bathroom. Soon, they’ll move to Charleston, where they’re planning on renting out a little apartment near campus that’s also close to the local news agency where John B has secured a job as a junior investigative journalist. In a couple of years he’ll be old enough to apply to train as a police officer. (He’s hoping he can make Sheriff Peterkin proud.)

JJ spends all summer goofing off, smoking way too much weed, attempting double backflips off of the side of the HMS Pogue (he lands it one time but fails the other thirty-seven) and surfing almost every day. He’s been living with John B and Sarah at the Chateau since the day he waved goodbye to the Phantom forever, and he’ll stay living there and out of his dad’s goddamn hell-house for as long as he can. He’s scored an apprenticeship at a local mechanic’s as an auto technician that starts the first week of September, which he’s actually kind of excited about. It pays more than being a busboy, allows him to pay rent to John B’s absent Uncle T at the Chateau, and gives him something to do during the week that isn’t just smoking and moping around. 

He returned the hot tub and paid the restitution money to Topper and his stuck-up, can’t-take-a-joke Kook family — even after Pope pleaded to let him pay for what really was _his_ fault — then used a quarter of his gold bar to buy himself an upgraded motorbike. The rest went into savings. (Yes, JJ’s usually impulsive, but having that much money in the bank feels nice.)

While JJ seems to have given up any hope of relocating to Yucatan, Kiara is certainly planning on getting out of Dodge as soon as her bank account allows. She’s been working part time at the Wreck all summer and will switch to full time come September. Her mom and dad are also expecting her to pay board for living at home, which seems kind of ridiculous since it’s her _dad_ who pays her wages. Once her bank account hits a number comfortable enough to prove to her parents she can make it on her own, she’ll move to Thailand (trading in her gold bar for cash first, of course) to work at an elephant rescue centre. 

And from there, she’ll travel the world. Asia first, then Europe, then Africa. She’s not planning on coming home for a good few years. She refuses to think about how much she’s going to miss the Outer Banks. Or the people who live here. 

And so September rolls around with a few tearful goodbyes, promises to call everyday that won’t be fulfilled, and a rainstorm that floods the Chateau the day after the three skip town. 

Kie comes to help JJ clear out the place that evening. Together, they mop water from the kitchen floor, air out the mattresses and couch cushions, and reconnect the electricity to the fridge. When they’re done, they sit down on the still-slightly-damp carpet in the living room, crack open a few beers and turn on Netflix to watch _The Simpsons Movie_ , which JJ has always lauded as the second-greatest movie of all time right behind Shrek 2.

“What do you think is gonna happen now?” Kie asks when she’s two beers deep. What she doesn’t say is this: _I don’t know who I am without the three of them._

“I guess we just get on with life. You and me,” JJ replies. What he doesn’t say is this: _the worst part is that, eventually, you’re gonna leave me too._

“You and me,” Kie echoes. “To the OBX!” she exclaims in a half-drunken mock cheer and clinks her bottle with his.

“To the OBX!” he responds with a chuckle. He slides his arm around her shoulder and pulls her into a friendly side-hug which is only meant to last a few seconds, but then she’s sighing deeply and dropping her head to his shoulder, and his arm stays.

“I’m tired,” she says, lips moving around the mouth of the bottle before taking a swig. She doesn’t say what it is that she’s tired of, but they both know what she means. Time moves slowly in the off-season on the Outer Banks. This year will be even worse without school or friends to keep them entertained.

His arm remains draped over her shoulder until the credits roll. Neither of them think about what that might mean. The sun goes down, Kie bikes home, JJ falls asleep on the couch. 

And so begins the story of the Pogues who stayed behind.


	2. strictly a one time thing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i listened to 'meet me at our spot' by willow & tyler cole on LOOP while writing. do with that what u will
> 
> this one’s got some mild sexual content folks so if that ain’t the go, you can skip to the next chap!
> 
> (*sigh* do i know how to write characters or just dialogue..............)

Kiara has no interest in making any new friends now that Sarah, John B and Pope are gone.

She’s never been good at making friends with girls. Sarah Cameron was her first proper girl friend — which then ended terribly in tenth grade. It took them a long time to find their way back to each other and to rebuild that best-friendship they’d had for one summer in ninth. Sarah and Kie have barely anything in common, but that doesn’t matter. They’re like sisters. Kie’s not looking for anyone to replace her while she’s gone to college.

And besides, it’s not like Sarah is really _gone_. They video chat every couple of days and send copious amounts of Gossip Girl memes in the time between. Kie’s aware that at some point Sarah is going to become much busier with assignments and parties and John B and, inevitably, new friends — but right now, everything is just fine. 

As for boys? Well, she’s got JJ. And JJ has enough personalities to fill the role of at least three different people.

During the time John B and Sarah were missing, presumed dead, JJ and Kie spent a lot of time together, especially when Pope stopped speaking to her for a couple of weeks after the storm. (She never should have kissed him. She knew it was going to make things awkward, but she was full of adrenalin and pity and stress and she did it anyway.) 

The first night John B and Sarah were gone, Luke Maybank woke up from his pill-induced slumber to find the keys around his neck were missing and so was the Phantom. JJ thought he had been safe at the Chateau. Kie had never seen bruises like that in her life, and she hoped she’d never have to ever again. 

A month after the storm, they got word that the Coastguard had called off search and rescue. Kie had sat with JJ on the stoop of the Chateau and listened to him try to convince himself that miracles existed. _I’d feel it if he was gone_ , he’d said with stubborn tears in his eyes. _I’d know it. I’d feel it._

The morning she got a voicemail from an unknown number with what was unmistakably John B’s voice saying _we’ve got the wheat and we’re coming home_ , JJ had been the first she’d called, because she knew he needed to hear the good news the most out of the three of them. (And then Pope next, who had tried to pretend like he wasn’t crying when he’d half-heartedly joked that it was _so typical of John B to pull a stunt like this, he’s always been dramatic_.)

She was there for the day the cops reopened the investigation into the gold and stormed the Chateau, forcing John B to hand over the crate of gold bars he and Sarah had managed to steal from Ward’s Bahamas’ stash. She’s the one who held JJ back from choke-holding Officer No-Neck, pleading _maybe it’s better if we put this behind us_ but then, later, _let’s each take a gold bar, they’ll never know._

Kie had been by JJ’s side for all of it. 

And now it was time for him to be there for her. 

(And okay, what has happened to her this time is nothing compared to the complete shitshow that was their lives in senior year, but it’s still important. Relatively.)

It’s the week before Thanksgiving, which is typically the busiest holiday of the off-season for the Wreck. This year, it’s also the week a tropical depression hits the Outer Banks, leaving in its wake some fallen trees, rubbish in the harbour, and most importantly — a storm surge that’s just itching to be surfed. 

Kie had been scheduled to work the midday shift at the Wreck, but then JJ had texted her to say _Rixon’s Cove is pumping, let’s go!_ and, well, she couldn’t resist. Instead of putting on her work apron that morning, she’d put on her wetsuit. Then she had texted her dad to say _an emergency has come up with JJ - I can’t work today!_

Except the text didn’t go through — something with the cell towers after the storm. 

And she also forgot to ask Janie, one of the other waitresses, to cover for her. 

The surfing was great, but the arrival home wasn’t.

The house had exploded into an argument as soon as she set foot in the door. It began with _you can’t walk out on your job to go surfing, Kie!_ which escalated into _your mother and I have had to work hard for everything you’ve been given, but you choose to hang around with boys from the Cut and risk throwing it all away?_ which then changed tack to _bathing elephants all day is not a responsible life choice!_ and ended in the glorious crescendo of Kie screaming _it’s like if I don’t go to college, you’ll never be proud of me!_ and her father yelling back _you’re damn right, kid, especially if you keep acting like this!_

With her mother pleading for the two of them to calm down and her father’s voice mumbling a half-hearted threat to _find somewhere else to stay tonight!_ , Kie had slammed the door behind her and stormed out to her truck, frustrated tears pricking at her eyes. 

Which brings her to this present moment, fumbling to stick her keys in the ignition, mind racing a hundred miles an hour. There’s only one person she can really call. She picks up the phone, puts it on speaker, and reverses the truck.

He answers on the third ring. “You’re calling me. You never call me,” JJ says, matter of fact. 

Hearing his voice soothes her instantly. He’s always been good like that. Keeping her balanced, the yin to her yang. “Hello to you too, JJ. You home?”

She can practically _hear_ him smirk. “Yeah. Why?”

“You got beer?”

“I’ve got some of Sarah’s leftover vodka Cruisers?”

Kie tries to ignore the way her chest constricts when her best friend’s name is mentioned. It’s days like these when she wishes, more than ever, that she could drive over to the Chateau and rant it out with Sarah. Today, she’ll have to settle for JJ. “Even better. I’ll be over in twenty.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

* * *

JJ’s already halfway through one of Sarah’s too-sweet cruisers when Kie arrives at the Chateau. She finds him spread out on the couch, limbs akimbo, hair still half-damp from the sea. An episode of ‘Friends’ is playing on the TV.

She kicks her shoes off at the door and trudges inside with a sigh. He doesn’t look up from the TV when he grabs a drink and hands it to her. Kie mumbles her thanks and collapses onto the couch, lifting up JJ’s sock-clad feet to rest on her lap and taking a long swig of lime-infused vodka.

It’s strange to be at the Chateau without the others, especially John B and Sarah. Sarah’s books are still on the coffee table collecting dust in the same way that John B’s ukulele hasn’t moved from its spot next to the TV in weeks. The bedroom they call theirs has had its door shut for the past two months while JJ has been sleeping on the pullout couch-bed. She’d probably be inclined to think that was weird if she didn’t know him as well as she does. JJ’s got an attachment to John B that goes beyond friendship, goes beyond even chosen-brotherhood, goes beyond love or anything like that. Like Kie, JJ prefers to keep things close to his chest, especially when it comes to family. They’re all aware that his father is an abusive alcoholic, but none of them know much about JJ’s childhood and how he became friends with John B. She does know, however, that John B and Big John are kind of the only real family JJ’s ever had. 

She remembers the day they’d found out Big John Routledge was dead. All the attention had been on John B — and for good reason, of course. But JJ had felt it too. When the three of them had enveloped John B in a bear hug while he cried on Pope’s shoulder, Kie had reached behind John B’s back to grab hold of JJ’s hand. He had squeezed back so tight she thought her knuckles might crack, and when they eventually all pulled back from the hug, his eyes were swimming with tears.

JJ had always been the skinny towheaded kid in the background of all of John B’s pictures; a constant presence at school, on the boat, at the Routledge’s dinner table. She thinks, stealing a glance at this boy next to her, that he may be finding the relocation of John B to Charleston harder than he’s been letting on, especially since, unlike Sarah and Pope, John B is notoriously bad with communication and hasn’t replied to any of their messages in days.

Kie came here tonight to seek refuge from her own problems, but perhaps JJ needed this, too.

“I didn’t know Friends was on Netflix,” Kie says after ten minutes of the episode has already played through, breaking through the comfortable silence they’ve been sitting in.

“It’s not,” he replies. “John B had it on video.”

Kie hums in response and drains the rest of her bottle while Joey and Chandler dick around on the screen. JJ’s feet are warm in her lap, a comforting weight.

This is what she likes the best about being friends with JJ: that unlike John B, Pope, or even Sarah, JJ never pressures her. He never tries to be her knight in shining armour or a wise sage full of advice. That’s not to say he’s not intelligent or thoughtful or caring — just that sometimes it’s nice to sit with someone and feel understood without having to say a word. She’s never pushed him to talk about his fucked up childhood or his dad or the fact that she _knows_ John B should treat him better than he does. And because of that, she also knows he won’t push her to talk about what’s going on with her right now.

To be fair, though, Kie _did_ just storm into his house without so much as a hello and then proceed to drink all his alcohol, so she supposes he probably deserves some kind of an explanation. Plus, she’s still mad as hell at her parents and needs to turn that anger out on someone who can handle it. JJ is the perfect candidate.

“Bad day, today,” Kie offers up as a way of beginning the conversation. Out of the corner of her eye, she watches as JJ turns his focus away from the television and onto her. She keeps her gaze set on the screen, cheeks burning. (It’s from the alcohol, okay?)

After a long moment, she feels JJ’s eyes leave her face and turn back to the television. He takes a swig from his bottle and burps. “Wanna tell me what happened?” He’s trying hard to appear disinterested so that she’ll feel brave enough to be vulnerable. It’s the art of tricking Kie into spilling her guts, and all her friends have used it at some point.

“Well,” she sighs, readjusting JJ’s feet in her lap. “It started with them yelling about me surfing and not working. Ended with Dad spouting a whole load of shit about me not going to college, then telling me not to come home tonight. And I dipped.” She begins to play with the fraying thread at the top of one of his socks, just for something to keep her hands busy. The cotton starts to slowly unravel, and if JJ notices, he doesn’t say anything. 

“And you called me, because you know I’m the only person who truly loves you for who you are?”

Kie can’t help but chuckle. “ _And_ you’ve got free alcohol,” she says, raising her bottle in a mock toast.

“I’m guessing they don’t know you’re here?” JJ replies after a moment with an uncharacteristically gentle smile. And it’s the way he looks at her, like he can see right through her skin as if it were translucent, right through to all the stupid thoughts that have stuck themselves to the fleshy walls of her brain, like _maybe I should have gone to college like the rest of them_ and _maybe I don’t actually have any fucking idea what I’m doing._

There’s another thought, too. A dangerous thought that only rears its head on the odd occasion: that she’d probably do ridiculous things to keep JJ Maybank looking at her the way that he does. 

But that’s not a thought that needs to be explored right now — maybe ever. “Nope,” she says, breathing out another sigh. “And they don’t need to.” 

Because he is a saint, and because he knows her better than almost anyone in her life, JJ attempts to distract her from feeling like shit by suggesting they play a game. 

“C’mon,” he says. “Let’s play Go Fish.”

Kie pauses the TV and looks at him like he’s crazy, because _what?_ “Are we five?” she asks incredulously. 

JJ’s grin is lopsided and bright. He shuts off the TV and jumps out of her lap to search around the kitchen like an excited little kid. “No, not Go Fish like you’re thinking about. Go Fish like—“ he opens a drawer and pulls out a pack of cards. “Hey! Cards! Perfect.” He’s basically mumbling to himself by now, flicking through the deck to make sure all fifty-two Outer Banks-themed souvenir cards are there. Kie watches him as he stands in the kitchen in his threadbare socks, dirty grey sweatpants and an old Kildare County High School pullover, and those sugary drinks of Sarah’s must be going to her head too quick because she thinks he looks almost cute. His hair’s all sticking up straight with sea salt and there’s a beer stain on his sweater and he’s her best friend and completely out of bounds — but he’s _cute_. 

JJ comes back to sit himself beside her on the couch, but facing her cross legged now. He begins to deal the cards. She’s still confused.

“You wanna tell me how this game works?” she asks, raising an eyebrow at him. He laughs, hands her a stack of seven cards, and explains his modified version of Go Fish.

Turns out the only new rules are: every time someone makes a set of four, an item of clothing has got to come off the loser, and a sip has to be taken when a ‘go fish’ is called. Kie predicts they’re both going to get very drunk. And maybe a little naked. Which isn’t that bad, actually — they’re adults, they’re friends, it’s nothing they haven’t really seen before, it’s just a game.

And they _do_ get very drunk, very quickly. Fuck Sarah and her vodka cruisers. 

Forty minutes passes and they’re three rounds in, each missing multiple items of clothing (JJ’s sweater and socks, Kie’s hoodie and singlet), when she blurts out of the blue, “I hate them. I wish they weren’t my parents.” She’s been terrible at remembering which cards JJ has in his hand, leading to a lot of ‘go fish’ calls. Three and a half bottles of sugary RTD’s later and her mouth is struggling to form vowels. She feels lazy and warm in the best way, and her feet are resting on JJ’s thighs with the deck of cards between them, and she finally feels like talking.

“No, you don’t,” JJ counters, picking up a card from the deck. “Look, _I_ hate my parents,” he says, pointing a finger at his chest and grinning. “Well, parent. Singular. I can’t really remember my mom. You—” and now that finger is pointed at her, “— _you_ do not hate your parents. Your parents are cool. I’m saying parents way too much. You know how when you say a word—“

“—too many times and then it sounds weird? Yeah,” Kie giggles. “Or like, you look at yourself in the mirror for too long and it’s like, how do eyebrows work? What purpose do they serve?”

JJ laughs. “Pope would know,” he says, then raises his eyebrows and asks, “You got an ace?”

Kie does, so she hands it over, trying not to focus too much on the way his fingers brush hers when she passes the card. “Pope knows everything. Do you think he’s gonna get a girlfriend in college? Also, you got an eight?” 

“Go fish.” Kie goes to take a sip from her bottle and finds it’s almost empty. “I sure hope so,” JJ answers with a smirk. “Maybe he’ll finally stop being so hung up on you.”

She rolls her eyes and retorts, “He’s not _hung up_ on me. We only kissed once. Nothing else happened.” Kie’s not a huge fan of being reminded of how she broke Pope’s heart back in their gold-searching summer. It had taken a while for them to get back to being friends after she’d turned him down again. “No one’s hung up on me,” she says as an afterthought, because it feels like something that needs to be clarified.

JJ reaches up to hook a finger in his shark tooth necklace — the one that he’s never without, that seems to be merely an extension of his body — and says, “You’d be surprised.” Then, very quickly as a follow-up, “You got a three?”

Is she drunker than she thinks she is? Did he really imply that—? “What’s that supposed to mean?” 

His shoulders lift up into a shrug and he’s biting back a smile, staring down at his cards like they’re the most interesting things in the world. “I’m not saying anything.”

“What, you’re pining after me too?” she says, turning this into a joke, because if it’s not, what’s she supposed to do? “We only kissed once, JJ, and it was like, eighth grade. It doesn’t count.”

He holds up his hands in defence and that smarmy grin won’t leave his face. “I never said I was pining after you,” he says, like it’s Kie’s fault for inferring that he would ever _dare_ to have feelings for her.

“Oh my god. You are! You so are!” Laughter bubbles up from her throat and she’s not sure if it’s genuine or nervous. 

“You’re not even a good enough kisser for me to be hung up on you after _one_ kiss,” he says, playing along. The memory of that night at John B’s birthday flashes across her mind, a little dusty like the tops of Sarah’s books. That was the first night she’d ever got drunk. They’d played spin the bottle out on the deck of the Chateau when Big John was out on an overnight fishing trip, twelve or so teenagers crammed up against each other in the heat of the evening. JJ had been wearing that same shark tooth necklace and she’d had on her favourite old pair of Converse, and when he’d been dared to kiss her, he hadn’t flinched away like the other boys had to some of the girls. “Hello? Did you hear me before? I said: _do you got a three?_ I’m playing a very serious game here, Kie.”

She clears her throat. “Yes, fine, I got a three. Here.” 

He grins. “Thank you. I’ve got a full set. Ha! Sucker.” He fans out the set of four on the fabric of the couch and motions for Kie to remove an item of clothing, as per the rules.

Kie, having lost miserably in previous rounds, is already down to just her bra and linen trousers. This is the make or break — is she going to make it weird, or is she going to carry on as normal? Because this is normal, right? They’re just having fun, right? She can definitely take her pants off and sit opposite him on the couch in her underwear, because they’re friends and this is a game and everything is _fine._

She keeps talking so she can’t psych herself out and stands up to strip off her trousers. She knows JJ’s watching her. It sets her skin on fire. “I can’t believe you think I’m a bad kisser. I’m a _great_ kisser,” she insists as she kicks off her pants and sits back down on the couch, tucking her knees into her chest.

“No, you’re not,” JJ teases, and the left corner of his mouth is turned up into the most annoying smirk she’s ever seen. “You were sloppy, and—“

“I was _fourteen!_ ” Okay, alright, she’s dipping into unknown territory here. They’re definitely flirting. God fucking damn it, she’s got a lot more complicated feelings about this than she thought she would.

“Bad is still bad!”

“I’m not a bad kisser, okay? I’ve kissed plenty of people. Ask anyone.”

“Anyone? You’ve kissed _everyone_ in town?”

“What? No! I’m just trying to say— I’m not a bad kisser, and you know it.”

“Prove it then.” And just like that, the mood switches.

Kie’s heart drops to her stomach. Suddenly, she wants to grab all her clothes and put them back on as fast as she can, because the way JJ is looking at her right now is reckless, reckless, _reckless_. 

Her mouth is bone-dry and her tongue feels fat when she replies, “Huh?”

“I dare you.” She watches as JJ leans back into the cushions of the couch and darts out his tongue to wet his lips, staunch and arrogant, like she’s just another one of the girls he fucks around with then never calls again. Like he knows what move she’ll make before she makes it, because he knows she wants him, has maybe wanted him for a long time. And it fucks her off, because he’s right. 

How is she supposed to think straight when he looks like that, all ruffled hair and skin that seems to be permanently tanned even in winter, nineteen-year-old boy muscles and sea-blue eyes? When he looks at her like this, like he’s been waiting for this too?

She’s not an idiot. She’s seen When Harry Met Sally (or, rather, was forced to watch it by Sarah Cameron). Boys and girls can never be _just friends._ Kie knows that from experience — she’s had half-crushes on both Pope and John B. As much as she wants to convince herself that they’ll be able to go back to normal after all this, she knows she’d be lying to herself. It doesn’t stop her from wanting to try, though.

She decides to do what she does because 1. she’s never been one to back down from a dare; 2. she wants to wipe that stupid self-satisfied grin off of his face; 3. when they’d kissed at the birthday party, he had tasted like cheap beer and saltwater, and she wonders if he’d still taste like that now, or if it would be a little more vodka-y; 4. if her dad ever found out about this, he’d be fuckin’ pissed, and that makes her happy; and 5. she’s just drunk enough now that she could justify this in the morning as one other in a long line of bad decisions.

And fuck it if JJ’s abs don’t look inviting.

Draining the last few drops of her bottle for some extra liquid courage, Kie surges forward and does something she’s only done once before: she kisses him.

She figures that if she kisses him careful he might pull away, so she refuses to give him the chance. The kiss is close-lipped, searing, hard. Her eyes are squeezed shut, so tight she’s starting to see stars in the black. After three seconds, she starts to pull away, thinking that’s probably all she needs. But then, all in one smooth movement, JJ’s hands are on her, one cupping her face, one pressed against the small of her back, pulling her towards him until she’s falling into his lap.

As soon as her bare thighs connect with the sides of his hips, Kie knows there’s no turning back. And not only because this is going further than just a cheeky kiss for a dare, but because it feel so fucking _good_ she wouldn’t be able to stop even if she tried. 

All the pent up anger at her parents, the loneliness she still feels at her best friends leaving, the fact that she’s always kind of wanted to know how this would feel: it all comes tumbling out into the kiss, into her breath in his mouth, into her hands in his hair. And _God_ , his hair is so soft from the sea, slipping through her fingers as she runs them through it. 

JJ’s palms are heavy on her hips, holding her steady as he kisses her like he’s been wanting to do this for a long time, and the fervor at which she kisses him back is almost embarrassing. She pulls back for a moment and looks down at him, hands still tangled in his hair, and admires the way his eyes have gone as dark as the night outside, clouded over with what feels like desire. She watches as his mouth opens and moves to form the three letters of her nickname and she knows if she lets him speak, she’ll talk herself down from this. But there’s no going back. It’s impossible. 

“Just once,” she promises, voice breathy and rushed. “A one time thing. It doesn’t mean anything.”

“Right, right,” JJ mumbles, trying to push up to kiss her again, but she’s too far away. Her hands move from his hair to his cheeks. The pad of her thumbs brush against his lower lip and the way he looks at her as she does so is just _criminal._

“No feelings. It doesn’t—“

“Fuck, Kie, shut up. C’mere.” And now he’s the one reaching up to grab a fistful of her hair, already unraveling from its messy bun, pulling her down to meet his lips again.

There’s no point trying to resist him, especially since heat is already building at the apex of her thighs as she feels him pressing up against her. And besides, it’s not like she’s never thought about this.

She’s heard the stories — both from him while talking shit with the other guys around a campfire at Rixon’s Cove, and from whispered rumours from girls at her school. JJ’s apparently pretty good with his hands. And his mouth. And everything else. As he slides his hand under the waistband of her cotton underwear, she realises they had all been telling the truth.

Her bra comes off pretty soon after that, quickly followed by JJ’s sweatpants until they’re both more naked than not, and JJ’s hands are skimming up and down her back, and his mouth is trailing open-mouthed kisses along her breastbone, and it’s the last week of November but it’s so hot in the living room it feels like it could be June.

There’s no time to think. No time for second-guessing. That fucking lime-flavoured vodka, filled with additives and preservatives she’d normally never injest, is pumping endorphins into her brain at an alarming rate, and every cell in her body is screaming out for more skin, more touch, more heat, more _JJ._

Kie slips a hand under the elastic waistband of JJ’s boxers and he stills for a second. “You sure?” he asks, mumbling against her lips.

She’s honestly never been simultaneously more confident and less sure of something in her life. Even so, she says, “Yes.” Then, “Condom?”

Somehow they make it to the bedroom with the permanently-shut door, because neither of them can apparently be bothered pulling out the couch-bed, and the door creaks when they open it, and the room smells like dust, but Kie doesn’t care. She needs JJ on top of her, like, yesterday. And then maybe under her. 

They scramble onto the musty bedspread, a mess of gangly limbs and hair and lips that don’t want to leave each others’. Kie struggles out of her underwear and rifles through the bedside drawer for a condom while JJ shucks his boxers and kicks them off to the side of the room. This is not Kie’s first time, and it’s certainly not JJ’s either, but there’s a nervousness and a sweetness to the way JJ looks at her, like this she’s the first naked girl outside of YouPorn he’s ever seen in his life. 

It’s not long before his mouth is back on hers, his hands running along her sides like he can’t believe she’s real, can’t touch her too hard or she’ll break. Then she’s sucking in a deep breath and he’s pushing up into her with a soft grunt, and she’s gripping the back of his neck as she arches her back and whispers, “J—”

“I got you,” he says, pressing feather light kisses to the side of her face then leaning back on his forearms to grin at her, so bright, like he’s just won the fucking lottery. “I’ve got you,” he repeats, then she’s pressing up to kiss him again, and the world behind her eyes goes all black and red and glittery.

Is it weird that she’s fucking her best friend in a room that’s basically a shrine to her other best friends? Yes. Maybe. Probably? But fuck it. _Fuck_ it. No one has to know.

She’s drunk. He’s drunk. They’ll forget about this in the morning. 

It really doesn’t have to be that complicated.

(Except Kie’s really nowhere near plastered, and JJ’s kisses don’t even taste like vodka.)

* * *

Kie wakes up to the sun streaming through old saltwater-warped wooden blinds and JJ’s arm thrown over her waist. For a short moment, she thinks she’s dreaming. But then she blinks, and the sun is still shining right into her eyes, and JJ is snoring softly into her shoulder.

Memories from the night before come flooding back into her mind accompanied by a throbbing headache. JJ’s hands, JJ’s mouth, JJ’s--

Okay, fuck. _Fuck._ Sleeping with her best friend seemed like a great idea the night before. Now? Not so much. Even if he does look adorable with his face smushed against the pillow.

She reaches for her phone to check the time: 8:46am. _Shit._ She’s meant to be at work in fourteen minutes. While she’s still mad at her dad for the shit he said to her last night, she’s not that much of an asshole that she’d purposefully miss two shifts in a row. Kie’s looking to get to Thailand, not to getting kicked out of her house.

Carefully, Kie lifts JJ’s arm from her middle and places it back down on the bed. He doesn’t stir. She stands up and searches for her underwear, quickly shrugging them on. Her pants and shirt are still in the living room, so she goes to tiptoe down the hallway to retrieve them. Just as she makes a move, a floorboard creaks. Too loud. Fuck this old fishing shack John B calls a house.

She hears JJ suck in a deep breath as he wakes himself up and she turns to find he’s pushed himself up onto his elbows, rubbing a tired hand over his face. He squints at her and cocks his head, wordlessly asking the question _where are you going?_ The sheets that were covering his body fall to his waist, baring his chest. Kie’s reminded of the feeling of running her hands across the smooth expanse of his skin and the way his stupid shark tooth necklace hung down from his neck while he’d--

Yeah, no, she’s not going there right now. Suddenly, she feels incredibly awkward, standing here topless in front of him. She quickly crosses her arms over her chest and clears her throat.

“We’re never speaking of this ever again, okay?”

A slow smile of quiet understanding spreads across JJ’s face. “Yes, ma’am. I was drunk, you took advantage of me.”

“What?” she huffs. “That’s _not_ what happened.”

“As far as I can remember,” he shrugs, like he knows what he’s doing by winding her up like this. “ _you_ kissed _me._ ”

“Yeah, as a dare!”

“You still made the first move.”

“Whatever. It wasn’t even that good,” she sighs. The way JJ bites his lip to keep from laughing lets her know that he, too, knows that’s a lie. “JJ, I mean it.” She raises her eyebrows at him in an attempt to appear serious, which is kinda hard to do when she’s wearing nothing but a dirty pair of flowery underwear. “This--” she gestures to the space between the two of them, “never happened, okay?”

“Got it. Deny, deny, deny.” He lifts his hands up in surrender then falls back into the pillows, all with that annoying grin. 

Feeling restless and frankly, slightly embarrassed, Kie mumbles, “I have to go to work,” and disappears down the hallway, not stopping to hear JJ’s response.

She finds her lost articles of clothing strung across the living room (bra under a couch cushion, pants under the coffee table, hoodie strung over the back of the armchair, shirt tucked between the couch and the wall) and dresses, readying herself for the day. She’ll have to go to work in clothes that stink of vodka and sweat, but it’s all she’s got.

Walking to her truck, sun at her back, she tries not to think about how the boy in the dusty bedroom might be all she’s got, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tsk tsk tsk kie, thinking u and jj will be able to be Totally Fine after this ....... u got another thing coming boo
> 
> thank you to everyone who commented on the prologue and got so excited with me for this chapter !! ya'll make me wanna write. i hope this lived up to the hype !!


	3. where we belong

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is so angsty omg i'm sorry ....... we love the Late Teenage Angst / Young Adolescent Bullshit tho right
> 
> also so much kie x sarah in this chapter and i'm not even sorry
> 
> i'm so emotional about these fucking kiiiiids man what do i doooo
> 
> thank u all for waiting so patiently for this next chap.... life has been kicking my ass this week so this took a lil longer but i hope it is still good !!

Kie and JJ haven’t spoken more than three times in the last week, which is kind of a record, if you don’t count ninth grade.

The first time they spoke since _that night_ was Kie texting him to ask if she had left her singlet at the Chateau. The second time they spoke was when he texted her back to say _yep, it’s in the living room, but I’m at work right now so you can just go pick it up_ . The third time they spoke was when she’d texted him back to say _cool, thanks._

They’ve yet to meet again in person.

Thank God that a full week of shifts at the Wreck and the craziness of Thanksgiving dinner has been keeping Kie busy, because if she had a whole bunch of free time to think about what had happened between them, she might have gone insane. (There’s still hours to lay awake in the middle of the night and rethink every single decision she’s made in the past week that has led her to this point, but hey, at least she’s not thinking about it at work, right?)

The three who went to college return to the Outer Banks for the winter holidays the week after Thanksgiving, and their arrival is a sweet relief. 

John B and Sarah arrive first, showing up to the Carrera household on a Sunday evening. Kie, like a lost kid waiting for their parents to come pick them up, has been waiting in the cold out the front of the driveway, listening intently for the sound of Twinkie’s engine, since Sarah had texted her ten minutes ago saying _we’re almost there!_

Kie looks up at the sky (it’s only six o’clock but already dark — she hates winter) and tries to match the stars to the constellations to pass the time. Last summer, Sarah had made it her mission to teach Kie and the boys all about constellations and which stars were planets and how to spot them all. Now, every time she looks up at a clear night sky and sees those sparkling lights shining from a million light-years away, she thinks of her best friend.

She spots Ursa Major — the Great Bear — just as two headlights careen around the corner of her street, the sound of a Vampire Weekend song blasting from the vehicle’s stereo, a figure hanging half out of the window screaming, “Kie!”

 _Sarah!_ her heart shouts in reply, and a huff of breath catches in her chest. Kie waits until the van has pulled to a stop under the streetlights by the letterbox to catch a proper glimpse of her two best friends.

But then Sarah steps out of the van, and Kie immediately notices something is off. It’s not her clothes — the baggy hoodie, one of John B’s, is nothing new. It’s not her smile nor the way she looks at Kie — still the same, still genuine and joyful, full of teeth that never needed braces.

It’s her hair.

Once halfway to brunette, now a bright honey blonde. It’s a small change — the tiniest, really, just her roots — but for whatever reason it feels like a big one. Kie’s stomach sinks to her feet and it feels, embarrassingly, something like disappointment. Or loneliness. Like being the last one picked for a game of lunchtime baseball, or the only person in the room not in on the joke.

The grin that had been stretched across Kie’s face droops slightly. Sarah steps towards her and opens her arms for a hug. Kie obliges, still bewildered. “You dyed your hair,” Kie says when they pull back, and it’s meant to be a question but the words fall flat leaving her mouth.

“Oh, yeah!” Sarah’s eyes widen as she realises the meaning behind Kie’s words, clearly remembering that she’d never mentioned her new hair colour. Not that Kie expected her to, it’s just— another thing she’s missing out on, she guesses. “Sorry,” Sarah continues, an apologetic smile spreading across her face. She flips some hair over her shoulder and tilts her head to show Kie the blonder roots. “I wanted to show it off to you in person. You like?”

“Oh, yeah.” Kie forces a smile that’s happier than she feels. “Yeah!” she repeats, brighter this time. “It’s cute.”

Sarah opens her mouth to say something else but is cut off by the approach of John B and his arm flinging across the back of Kie’s shoulders. “Hey, Kie!” he greets, pressing a smacking kiss to the side of her forehead then reaching across to ruffle her hair. “Missed ya.”

Kie grabs his hand and pushes him away. Her thumb rubs over the palm of his hand in passing and she grins at him. “No more calluses, huh?” she teases. “You going soft in Charleston, JB?” 

“I’ll get them back this winter, believe me!” he tosses back with a cheeky glint in his eye. Kie, however, doesn’t miss the way John B subtly rubs his palms together as if to check for calluses before sliding them back into his pockets. _Good_ , she thinks with an inward grin, _let him never forget where he belongs_. 

And where he — and Sarah and Pope — belong is here in the Outer Banks with her. And JJ.

The three of them turn to walk down the short driveway to the Carrera household. Kie can see that her dad has opened the door to welcome them all in. Light pours out onto the porch, her dad’s shadow blocking some of it. She hears him faintly call John B’s name in greeting, and the boy whips his head up and replies, “Mr Carrera!” before bounding on ahead like an excitable puppy.

(Kie remembers a time, back in high school, when her dad did not approve of her hanging around boys like John B at all. He’s still not the Pogues’ biggest fan, but this past summer, John B managed to wrangle his way into Kie’s dad’s heart and become the favourite of his daughter’s friends. She has no idea how it happened, but she’s kind of grateful. Disregarding the blow-up they had a week or two ago, their unlikely friendship has settled some of the animosity between her Kook dad and Pogue friends.)

Alone now, Sarah slides her arm around Kie’s waist and pulls her to her side as they walk in step together. 

“I missed you,” Sarah whispers, leaning her head against Kie’s. 

Kie rests her arm around Sarah’s shoulders and squeezes her arm gently in reply. The other girl smells wonderfully familiar — like the fresh cotton-scented perfume she always wears and the green apple shampoo she’s washed her hair with for as long as Kie can remember. It’s nice to know not _everything_ has changed. “I missed you, too.”

* * *

Pope arrives home the Monday after. As soon as he steps foot back on North Carolinian soil, he’s organising pizzas and beer on the beach for the five of them.

It’s fucking freezing when they get down to their favourite spot at Rixon’s Cove — a few yards back from the sand, tucked under the shelter of trees — and Kie’s cold to her bones, even though she’s wrapped in one of her mom’s knitted blankets and her thickest down jacket. John B had driven them all here in Twinkie, with Sarah in the front and JJ, Pope and Kie squished in the back. 

She’d given Pope the biggest hug when she’d seen him, having missed his soft smile and the cautious way he always said hello, like he was never quite sure if the person he was greeting was really glad to see him or not. Well, she was forever happy to see Pope. There had been a short period back in junior year when they hadn’t spoken due to the complete shitstorm that erupted after they kissed at the docks, after John B and Sarah went missing, after she was forced to confess to him when he dropped her home after their first official date that she wasn’t sure she really saw him in _that way_ , and she wouldn’t want to return to that time even if someone offered her a million bucks. Even if, despite the grief of losing three people she cared most about, those had been the sweet days she’d spent mostly with JJ. She could never again go without Pope Heyward in her life. She’s missed his quick wit and irrelevant-fact-rants and the way his eyes light up when someone mentions Walt Whitman, and will continue missing all the parts of him when he leaves again for Florida.

All the ride to Rixon’s, Pope hadn’t stopped talking about his past three months at college. How his dorm room is one of the biggest on his floor, how his Forensics professor brings his dog to class, and how he swears he saw Floyd Mayweather (or a guy who looked eerily similar) walking the beach next to his campus.

JJ, on the other hand, hasn’t said a word to anyone, least of all Kie. Which is strange, because usually JJ’s a box of birds and no one can shut him up. Kie isn’t sure if she should be worried or not, though. Stealing a glance at him as they climb out of the warm vehicle and into the cold night air, Kie wonders if perhaps he’s just overwhelmed. He keeps looking at everyone with a quiet kind of grin, like he’s trying to drink in all the sounds of their laughter and memorise the shape of their smiles. She feels that way, too. She felt it when she saw Sarah’s new hair, when she teased John B about his lack of calluses, when she hugged Pope. 

Maybe she doesn’t blame him for being quieter than usual.

(Maybe she still reads into it too much and thinks it’s because he doesn’t want to talk to her anymore.)

“Tell me why we decided to come _outside_ again? When it’s barely fifty out?” Sarah complains, newly-blonde hair hidden under a beanie, as they trudge through the underbrush from the van to the spot they had cleared out long ago under the pine trees for regular campfires.

“Because we missed this place too much,” John B responds with a cheerful grin, hand in Sarah’s. 

“Yeah, well, this place missed you, too,” JJ replies, the first words he’s spoken since they picked up Kie from her parents place twenty minutes ago. It makes her smile.

They eat lukewarm pizza and drink cold Milwaukee's Best around a campfire that John B and JJ built with a pile of dry driftwood, trading college and work stories, sitting shoulder-to-shoulder on sea-battered logs of wood and sharing blankets. It’s comfortable and familiar and bittersweet all at once. 

Parts of it are strange, though, like the way JJ accidentally touches her fingers when passing her a beer and quickly yanks his hand away like he’s been burnt, or how he makes a note to step out of her way whenever they pass by each other, avoiding her eyes. He’s loosened up with everyone else now (she’s never thought of JJ being someone who needed to warm up to people, but here we are), except for her. He hasn’t said more than three words to her the whole night. And those three words were just _pass the marshmallows?_

Later, while the boys dance silly around the campfire and try and drunkenly perfect a new kind of secret handshake, Sarah and Kie sit off to the side, wrapped up in Kie’s mom’s blanket. Their jean-clad legs press against each other underneath the wool, keeping them both warm. 

“How are things here, really?” Sarah asks after they’ve been sitting in comfortable silence for a while. Her head rests on Kie’s shoulder. 

There’s so many things Kie could say. So much she _wants_ to say. Like _JJ and I hooked up and I thought I was cool with it but it’s made things so weird and I just want my best friend back_ or _I miss you so much I don’t know what to do with myself, but I don’t want to bother you too much_. Instead, she says, “Uh, they’re fine. Boring. I’ve just been working—“

Sarah lifts her head and nudges Kie in her side. “You know that’s not what I’m talking about,” she says softly. “How has it been with just you and JJ?” Kie turns to look at her and finds Sarah’s eyes are sparkling with mischief. It puts Kie immediately on the defensive.

“Oh. Fine.”

“Fine?” Sarah prods, raising her perfectly-shaped brows. “Just _fine_?”

Fuck. Did JJ say something to John B? Kie swallows hard and tucks a stray curl of hair nervously under her beanie. “Yeah?”

“Well, have you guys been hanging out much?"

“Yeah.”

“And?”

“And what? We’re friends. We spend most of our time complaining about how much we miss you guys.” Kie fiddles with the corner of the blanket, twisting the fabric around her index finger. 

“ _Okay_ ,” Sarah replies, dragging out the vowels, and if Kie was brave enough to look her in the face, she knows her friend would be rolling her eyes. “Why is he avoiding you then?”

“He’s not avoiding me—“

“Shut up,” Sarah interrupts, elbowing Kie none too gently. “He is. Something’s weird. The vibe’s all wrong. What happened?”

“I really don’t know what you’re talking about,” she lies. She betrays herself soon enough, though, when she looks out over the fire at the boys and lets her gaze linger a little too long on JJ. He’s playfully wrestling with John B, both of them laughing, while Pope sits on a log with a drink in his hand, grinning at the two and shaking his head like he’s an exasperated but doting parent. 

Sarah clearly can’t take the ambiguity for another second because she’s pulling on Kie’s arm until she turns around to face her. “Okay, you’re gonna tell me what’s up right now or I’m gonna have to ask JJ,” she says with an eyebrow playfully raised, jabbing her thumb in the direction of the boys. Kie’s eyes flit over to the scene that’s unfolding over by the campfire: JJ’s got John B in a headlock, giving him a noogie while Pope howls with laughter at John B’s struggling. John B tries to fight back, managing to swing an arm up behind him to knock the beanie off of JJ’s head. “That kid’s incapable of keeping a secret. I know he’ll tell me right away.”

“What?” Kie gulps, trying her best to keep a straight face. “What secret?”

“ _Kie_ ,” Sarah says, dramatically throwing back her head with a groan. “We’ve been best friends for years. I know you.” Then Sarah’s looking at her with those dark brown eyes and Kie knows she’s not going to be able to lie. Sarah leans in and whispers conspiratorally, “Now tell me: did you guys fuck?”

 _Oh, shit._ Kie’s stomach drops. Shit. She thought the worst Sarah would ask would have been _did you guys kiss?_ or something similar to which Kie would have been able to give a half-true answer. But this? “What? How did you-- why would you go straight to _that_? That’s so—“

Sarah’s eyes go wide. Her mouth falls open in surprise. “You did? Oh fuck, I was just joking but—” Try as she might, Kie can’t keep the blush off of her face. It’s clearly visible even in the dark because Sarah whoops with laughter and whisper-hisses, “you did, didn’t you! Oh my _god_ , I knew it. I _knew_ this would happen eventually.” Then, as an aside to herself, “Fuck yeah.”

Time for some damage control, and _fast,_ except Sarah’s grinning now, and-- “Sarah, we— Wait, why are you _happy?”_

“Because you’ve been hung up on each other for years, duh,” Sarah replies, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. Her smile is blinding. Kie feels sick. “We all saw it.” Without missing a beat, Sarah twists herself into a cross-legged position on the log and the blanket drops from her lap. She doesn’t pick it up when it falls to the sandy ground, evidently too excited about this new information to care. Kie bundles the blanket up onto her thighs, using the warmth and the heavy wool as a comfort against the deer-in-the-headlights feeling she’s got right now.“Okay, so. How many times?” Sarah asks, propping up her chin in her hands and leaning forward to whisper like they’re girls at a sleepover.

“How many times what?”

“Don’t play dumb with me, Carrera. How many times did you _do_ it?”

Excuse her, but Kie’s gonna play dumb for as long as she wants. It’s her God-given right. “That’s— _Sarah_ —“

“Tell me! Please. I’ll ask JJ—”

And fuck Sarah Cameron for her inability to take no for an answer. “Fine! Fine,” Kie hisses. “Once, okay? Just once. And now it’s weird, and I didn’t want it to be weird but it is, and we haven’t really talked about it.” The confession spills out of her with surprising ease. It actually feels kind of good to say out loud. 

“I get it,” Sarah nods. “It’s a strange feeling to look someone in the eye and think _you were literally inside me_ , like, I don’t blame—“

“Sarah,” Kie groans, gritting her teeth. “I _will_ fucking murder you if you keep talking.”

“Damn, Kie!” Sarah laughs, holding up her hands in defence. “Alright, alright.” Sarah tugs part of the blanket back from Kie and they wrap themselves up in it again. Kie, feeling more relaxed now that she’s not holding that huge secret in anymore, sighs and leans her head against Sarah’s shoulder. “Look at them,” Sarah says after a moment of silence. “They’re so stupid.” She jerks her head in the direction of the boys who are still dicking around like kids around the campfire. None of them have turned their attention to the girls at all in the past twenty minutes, and Kie’s grateful for that. If Pope or John B -- or, God forbid, JJ -- overheard their conversation, Kie would die of embarrassment. 

And, oh God, now she’s thinking about an alternate universe where one of them _did_ hear them talking, and a hot red blush creeps up onto her face once again. How would she explain that to the boys? How would JJ react? Would he be mad? Would he deny it? Or would he continue looking at her with that confused expression he’s had on his face for the past couple weeks every time she’s seen him, like he’s not sure where he stands with her anymore, but he doesn’t want to talk? “I can’t believe I slept with JJ, Sarah,” Kie mumbles into the fabric of Sarah’s sweater. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I’m such a fucking idiot.”

Sarah presses a sweet kiss to Kie’s forehead and says, “You are, but I love you.”

Kie smiles, weight easing from her shoulders. “I love you too,” she says. Then, because she can’t resist, “Make any new best friends while you were gone?”

“No one could ever replace you, Kie,” Sarah chuckles, and Kie loves the sound. “You know that.”

As much as she has hated almost every moment of this conversation, Kie has the feeling of something unwinding inside her. Something that goes further back than just the week before Thanksgiving. Maybe even all the way back to that childhood game of spin the bottle, when JJ Maybank’s lips had first pressed against hers, and she’d realised that there was more to boys than just dirt and sweat and terrible jokes. 

And it fucking terrifies her.

* * *

Christmas passes in a rush of good food and wrapping paper and an unexpected snowfall. New Years approaches quickly, and with it a get-together at the Chateau. 

New Years Eves in the past have been big events consisting usually of a party down at the Boneyard or on some Kook’s launch with someone’s brother acting as Dj blasting hits from the early 2000s and a shitton of alcohol. This year is different. It’s low-key. Just the five of them with a crate of Corona Extra with lemon on the side and a few family-size packs of Doritos. 

Kie sits on her favourite of the armchairs in the living room of the Chateau, her legs kicked up over one arm, sipping on beer and casually watching the Times Square New Years Eve celebrations on television. Dua Lipa is singing. Kie’s not that interested, but it’s something to look at, at least.

Sarah and John B share the other armchair -- the one made of cane that’s considerably less comfortable than the plush worn cotton of Kie’s. Sarah sits on John B’s lap, curled in on him and whispering something in his ear which makes him laugh. Kie honestly doesn’t know how they look so cosy all squished up on that old chair, but, hey, maybe love blinds you to any pins and needles in your butt. She sniggers at the thought. Neither of the lovebirds notice her laughing at them.

JJ and Pope sit next to each other on the couch nearest to Kie, engaged in a conversation about Pope’s experiences at college that Kie is vaguely a part of. 

“Cut up any dead bodies yet, Pope?” she overhears JJ jokingly ask.

Pope has his back to Kie but she’s pretty sure he’s rolling his eyes. “We’re not supposed to call them _dead bodies_ , JJ. It’s unprofessional,” Pope replies, matter of fact. “They’re called _cadavers._ And no, I don’t get to see them ‘til sophomore year.” 

Good to see in the past few months, Pope hasn’t changed a bit. Still as driven, still as smart, still as into the weirdest fucking things as he always has been. Kie smiles at that. JJ does too, his eyes catching hers, a knowing glint in them, like he’s saying _can you believe this kid?_ Kie raises an eyebrow as if to say _I know!_ Then JJ’s attention is back on Pope, and Kie’s on the television.

It’s meant to be a happy night, as New Years generally is, but Kie can’t help but feel a little lost. 

Earlier that month, when Sarah and John B and Pope had first arrived back in town, she’d had the thought of _finally, they’re back where they belong._ On the Cut, with her and JJ, all five of them together again. Taking the HMS Pogue out for sunset drives and late-night fishing, scaling trees to rescue lost frisbees, drinking stolen beer on the front porch of the Chateau.

Now, listening to Pope talk animatedly about how excited he is for the coming semester, and watching John B and Sarah cuddle up together in the armchair on the other side of the room, Kie has the sinking feeling that she may have been in the wrong.

Perhaps they don’t all really belong here anymore. Perhaps there is such a thing as growing out of a place. Maybe even growing out of people.

She quietly observes JJ and Pope talking together on the couch beside her. JJ’s face is lit up with interest and love for his friend as he listens to Pope rattle off stories about labs he’s participated in and friends he’s made. He’s a good listener. Not for the first time since she saw him tonight, she remembers that evening only a few weeks ago when he listened to her rant about how frustrated she was with her parents. How he had calmed her down, made her laugh. And kissed her. She could never forget that — even if she so desperately wants now to, because she feels like she can’t look at him the same way anymore.

She wants to think that JJ is the only one out of the five of them who truly belongs here, a kid of the Cut through and through. Kie has plans. Big plans. Travelling, animal rescue, finding her inner self in the jungles of Southeast Asia. 

But pigeonholing JJ into the traditional Outer Banks-local stereotype feels wrong, too. And not necessarily because it’s untrue — for all his talk of beaches in Mexico, there’s a pretty high chance JJ really _will_ live here for the rest of his life, working at the same auto shop, living in the same house, surfing the same break — but because JJ feels like _more_ than that. He’s not lazy. He’s not unambitious. He has dreams just like the rest of them. 

Kie decides then and there, while sipping her third beer of the night, that she will never be the person who places limits on the wild, imaginative, determined mind that is JJ Maybank’s. 

Things are changing, sometimes too fast for Kie to handle. It’s like for the past three months she’s been trying to hold all the memories of the Pogues in her hands, but they keep slipping from her grip like silvery marbles, and when she goes to pick one up, the rest threaten to fall too. It could be time for her to put the marbles down for good. Make some new memories. Stop romanticising the past. Move on.

Everyone else seems to be doing that just fine.

There’s almost an hour left to go on the Times Square countdown when John B clears his throat and waves his phone in the air to get everyone’s attention.

“Hey, guys! I just got a text saying there’s a party down at the Boneyard,” he says. “Should we go? For old times’ sake?”

Well, hey. Maybe they’ll get that typical New Years Eve party after all.

“Old times? You’ve been gone three months, dude,” JJ replies, nose scrunching up into a grimace, which then changes quickly into an excited grin. “But yes. Fuck yes. Let’s go!” Then he and Pope are both jumping up from the couch and grabbing their jackets ready to head out into the cold.

It seems the boys have decided the majority consensus is to head to the beach, even though neither Kie or Sarah have expressed their choice on the matter. Usually Kie would have been happy to stay at the house and chill out with just the five of them, but given that today she can’t help but be hyper-aware of JJ’s proximity to her at all times, it might be nice to get out into the open air and around other people.

After spending ten minutes rifling through the couch cushions, John B finally finds the keys to Twinky and they all clamber into the van, a mess of puffer jackets and warm beanies. 

* * *

The Boneyard is packed with people despite the cool weather. Someone’s set up a makeshift DJ booth atop a pair of huge speakers and is blasting Travis Scott at an insane volume. There’s a few kegs that are pumping out cups of beer and campfires dotted along the beach. It feels so familiar and so like home, especially with her four best friends matching her footprints in the sand as they walk down from the carpark to the glittering lights of the party.

As soon as they hit the beach, everyone separates, hugging and chatting to people they haven’t seen in a while -- for everyone but JJ and Kie, it’s been months since they’ve seen some of their old friends from school.

Kie, still feeling a little melancholy, opts to sit off to the side of the buzz of the party on a worn-down log of driftwood. People she knows float past her one by one -- another waitress from the Wreck who jokes briefly about how hard Kie’s dad’s been working them lately; two old classmates who offer her a beer and two sets of hugs; one guy she’d gone on a date with one time last year who sits next to her for a moment and tries to start awkward conversation before he notices Kie’s not exactly interested and leaves her alone. 

She feels out of place in her own home, which is a strange and unwelcome feeling. It’s New Years Eve. She should be happy, right? But all she can really think about is how she doesn’t quite fit here anymore, and that maybe it’s not a case of Kie growing out of the Outer Banks, but the Outer Banks growing out of Kie. Most of the kids here are still in high school, little brothers and sisters of the kids she went to school with, their older siblings still away at their respective colleges or on world trips. Kie’s not used to feeling so weird about life like this. She prides herself on being happy-go-lucky, carefree, not caring about much else but reducing her use of plastics, smoking a ton of weed, and blasting Bob Marley on her car’s radio while driving around town. 

Not all this existential bullshit she’s thinking right now.

She takes a long swig of beer, wishing she had a joint on her right now. That might take some of the sting of this weird time away.

She thinks that maybe the only one here who really understands her is JJ, which is why she’s not entirely surprised when he eventually joins her at her spot on the log.

JJ doesn’t look altogether comfortable when he sits down beside her, holding his body at a rigid angle, like he’s scared of accidentally brushing up against her and entering her personal space. Like he’s nervous. 

It’s the most he’s done in the past three weeks to come close to her, but it’s not enough. She wants to talk. To clear the air. She’s done with fucking tiptoeing around each other, pretending like that night never happened, like things aren’t different. If she doesn’t bring it up now, when he’s clearly searched her out to talk to her, she might never have the balls to.

The atmosphere of the beach party and the upcoming promises of the new year leads Kie to say, with more confidence than she thought she possessed, “I thought this wasn’t going to be weird, JJ.”

He coughs and spills some of his drink. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and says, without looking at her, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” His tone of voice is definitely teasing -- maybe even a little flirty -- and it relaxes the tension in Kie’s shoulders. 

“C’mon,” she grins, turning to face him and immediately being struck by the way the moonlight dances across the sharp planes of his face, highlighting his cheekbones and the scar on his jaw. She swallows the admiration down and continues. “I know you hook up with girls all the time. I thought everything would be sweet. No drama,” she shrugs.

The comment about other girls seems to surprise him. He cocks his head at her. “And there isn’t any,” he retorts. 

Kie rolls her eyes. “You’ve barely talked to me in weeks.”

“I so have,” he ribs, shaking his head and looking down at his cup with a cheeky grin, swirling it’s contents. 

“‘Hello’ and ‘goodbye’ don’t count as talking,” she jokes, gently prodding him in his side. They both chuckle, then fall into a silence that’s part easy, part tension-filled. “If you don’t wanna talk about it, fine,” she says after a while, voice softer and more serious than before. “But can we at least go back to normal? I just wanna come over and watch The Simpsons without feeling weirded out.”

JJ, clearly having been uncomfortable with this conversation and thankful for Kie giving him a pass out of it, laughs nervously. “Yeah, ‘course.”

They settle back into silence, both just watching the party unfold in front of them. Pope, chatting up some random girl by a campfire down by the water. John B and Sarah trying to be conspicuous by making out in the relative darkness of the treeline at the top of the beach, but failing miserably in their attempted stealthiness as JJ and Kie can spot them easily. “I’m gonna miss these idiots,” Kie whispers.

“I won’t.”

And they both know that’s not true. 

Neither have a watch on them, but Kie figures it’s almost midnight as all around them people start shouting a countdown. “ _Ten! Nine! Eight!”_

There’s a commotion further down the beach as a couple of kids try to set up some fireworks without lighting each other on fire. A slight breeze blows over the sand, ruffling Kie’s loose braids and JJ’s messy hair. She catches him looking at her from the corner of her eye and ducks her head.

_“Four, three, two--!”_

In another universe, Kie would have leaned over and kissed him.

In this timeline, she settles for sitting next to him, enveloped in the warm feeling of being known and understood. 

She turns to him as the countdown hits one and watches the corners of his mouth tip up into a half-smile. “Happy New Year, Kie.”

“Happy New Year, J.”

He inches his hand closer to hers on the log and his pinky finger brushes against hers as they look up at the stars and the fireworks that are now exploding into colour. It’s a subtle touch, but enough to be intentional. She imagines hooking her pinky around his, drawing his hand in, holding it tight, kissing him again, holding him again. 

But that’s not what they do. That’s not the relationship they have, or the one Kie necessarily _wants_ them to have. When the three leave for college again tomorrow, Kie will be stuck with JJ as her only friend in town. And they’re so good as friends. She’s not about to fuck up the next six months because she can’t control her fucking hormones. 

Then JJ stands up, tipping his cap at her as a goodbye and flashing her the sweetest, softest smile that says more than she thinks she could ever say, and he’s gone, disappearing into the black of the night and the sound from the party on the beach.

* * *

John B, Sarah and Pope leave town the very next day. JJ and Kie stand by the letterbox at the Chateau and wave goodbye as the two cars drive off. They stand in silence for a moment, hands back in their pockets, watching as the dust settles on the dirt road. 

Then JJ is turning to her with a lopsided smile and sad eyes, saying, “I guess it’s just you and me again, huh?”

She studies his face for a moment — the hair curling over his ears, desperately in need of a cut (although she does love it long); the thin silvery scar on his jaw from an altercation with his dad two years ago after which she helped him clean up (she never wants to see him like that ever again); the shining blue eyes that always hold so much laughter (and chaos, and heartbreak, and tenderness) — and thinks again of the last time they were alone together and what came of that. Her gut twists up into knots at the mere thought of it.

But things are different now. Things _feel_ different. Even if she wanted it to happen again (which she’s not even sure she does), it wouldn’t be the same. Last night, she realised they don’t love each other like romantic walks on the beach or dinner dates at fancy restaurants on the mainland. They love each other like best friends do — like growing up together, like watching The Simpsons late at night because they have nothing better to do, like skinning their knees skateboarding in the park, like laughing together at Pope’s bad jokes. That’s all it is. Friendship. 

Except looking at him now, she’s not sure that’s really the truth. She opens her mouth to say something in reply, but he’s already turning from her, heavy boots kicking up dust as he walks back to the house. 

And suddenly she is alone in the driveway, and everyone and everything feels very far away. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> damn i'm in my feels now ..... brb listening to 070 shake on repeat.......
> 
> thank you all SO much for your lovely comments on the last couple chapters. ya'll are the best. as always, come cry with me on tumblr any time


	4. okay, maybe a two time thing?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> these IDIOTSSS i'm sorry
> 
> warning for non-explicit sexual content in this chap! 
> 
> p.s. terminal b and nice to have by 070 shake were on repeat while i wrote this. give them a listen and feel all the ANGST !

Life is easier in the weeks after New Years.

JJ and Kie are back to being how they were before: just friends, mucking around on their days off at the Cove, going surfing in the rain, staying up late on Sunday nights watching reruns of the Sopranos and drinking lukewarm beer. It’s good. It’s how it’s supposed to be. 

But even though it’s what they  _ should _ be, Kie can’t help but still dream of something more. She’s drawn to him in a way she’s never been to anyone. He’s magnetic. His smile is addictive. The way the five-o’clock light catches his hair and turns it golden when it filters through the living room blinds at the Chateau, or the way his fingers flex over the neck of a beer bottle — it’s all there to make Kie’s heart twist up into a fucking pretzel. 

She’s content with this, though. The crush will pass soon enough, and this will all be some silly memory she’ll laugh about years down the track with Sarah.  _ Hey, do you remember when I slept with JJ? God, what was I thinking?! _

This is the kind of attitude she has on one of the many nights Kie shows up to the Chateau after work to cook dinner with JJ. They started this sort of tradition two days after New Years when both of them were feeling a little lonely, and now they cook together at least three nights a week. (And it’s not weird, because they’re friends. If Sarah was here to hang out with instead of JJ, Kie would be doing the exact same thing. It’s not different at all, okay?)

Homemade orange chicken is on the menu for tonight. She lugs a bag of half-frozen chicken, spices and beer up the steps to the front door only to find that it’s locked. She swivels around to check the dirt driveway — JJ’s truck is still here, but his bike is gone. Evidently, he’s still at work. 

With a heavy sigh, Kie digs around under the front step to find the spare key and upon finding it, dusts herself off and steps inside.

She knows her way around this kitchen like the back of her hand, having cooked countless meals for Sarah and the boys — usually with Pope’s help — over the past few years. She gets right to chopping up the chicken and cooking the rice, keeping on eye on the clock on the wall that’s twenty minutes slow. 

JJ is half an hour late coming home. Kie’s already almost finished cooking by the time she hears his bike pull up and his heavy boots stomp up the stairs.

“So much for helping me, huh?” she teases, not looking up from the chopping board. 

“Sorry,” JJ grumbles. “Work ran late.” She can hear him kick off his work boots and pad over to the kitchen in his socks. He opens the fridge behind her to grab a drink then sets it on the counter and rifles through a cupboard on a quest to find what’s probably a missing bottle opener. It’s only now that Kie looks over at him.

“You look like shit,” she says with a smirk. The quip is really just a reflex, for while JJ  _ is  _ covered in splashes of dirt and motor oil, he looks good. More than good. The heavy navy coveralls he wears for work are unzipped to the waist revealing a dirty white tee underneath. It’s barely fifty-five degrees out, so he must have been working hard to warrant that much sweat. His cheeks are ruddy and his hair slicked back with flecks of grease. She slyly watches his throat move as he chugs a third of his drink, calloused hands wrapped around the cold glass. 

“I know,” he grins after burping loudly, an action that Kie crinkles her nose at. “I’ll shower soon. Dinner looks good.”

“I know,” she retorts with a matching smile. “I’m a fucking masterchef. Jamie Oliver, watch out!” Okay, so that wasn’t the best joke she’s ever made, but she’s feeling flustered at how fucking good JJ looks in those goddamn Dickies overalls. JJ laughs anyway. 

He reaches across her to grab a slice of orange — she’d zested one and cut it up for added flavour to the meal. “Had a Malibu Wakesetter come in this morning for a tune-up,” he says, leaning casually against the counter and munching on the orange slice while he watches her chop chives. “Owner wanted it back the same day, even though the motor was busted and the job should have taken three days, at  _ least _ .” He shakes his head, messy hair falling over his eyes. “Fuckin’ Kooks.”

“Watch your mouth,” she warns, biting her bottom lip to hide a smile and turning back to the chives. 

“Sorry— fuck every Kook but  _ you _ ,” he jokes. He slides past her in the cramped kitchen and ruffles her hair, then, in a move that almost seems unconscious, presses a quick, chaste kiss to the crown of her head.

Kie’s knife stills. She can feel JJ’s body freeze behind her, a short rush of breath escape his lips, like he’s also probably thinking  _ what the fuck possessed me to do that? _ Then he’s rushing past her and down the hallway, making a beeline for the shower, Kie’s reply of  _ I’m not a Kook! _ dying in her throat.

She swallows hard and continues to chop the chives, sprinkling them over the saucy chicken and rice. Sue her if she’s just feeling overwhelmed by the stupid amount of domesticity this dinner situation includes, but it almost felt  _ natural _ for him to touch her like that. Like he does that all the time. 

Dinner’s ready before JJ gets out of the shower. Kie contemplates eating it before he gets out as it looks so good, but decides that if the roles were reversed, she’d rather he wait for her. To waste some time, she dishes up two plates and clears the little dining table, leaving the tiny bunch of flowers she’d picked a week ago in their makeshift vase (a beer glass) in the middle of it. Realising that the scene now looks  _ way _ too domestic and date-ish, she’s about to move the flowers away when JJ appears in the hallway, clad only in a pair of sweatpants, a towel slung over his shoulders to catch water droplets from his still-dripping hair.

Kie sucks in a quick breath at the sight of his abs (fucking  _ glorious _ abs really — so unfair, because he never even works out) and the sharp lines of his hips emerging from the low-slung waist of his pants. The breath turns into a cough, and Kie makes herself red in the face trying to get rid of it. Hey, at least she can blame the blush on the cough, right?

“Hey, sorry,” JJ says as he sits down at the table, and Kie wonders if the apology is for being late to dinner or for the kiss situation in the kitchen before. Maybe both, she thinks as he tucks into his meal and avoids her eyes. He doesn’t mention the flowers. Kie’s grateful.

“Is it good?” Kie tentatively asks to fill the silence, even though she already knows she makes bomb orange chicken. 

His eyes — blue, blue eyes — flick up to meet hers as he shovels another forkful of chicken and rice into his mouth. “Delicious,” he replies, trying to grin around the mouthful of food. A few bits of rice fall from his mouth, and Kie laughs. The tension that had clouded the room before dissipates with the sound.

Later, they’re helping each other with the dishes — side by side, JJ washing, Kie drying — when Kie’s hand slips on a wet glass. JJ, with reflexes like a cat, shoots his arm out to grab it before it falls onto the wooden floor. The problem is that JJ has to reach across her body to catch the glass, twisting his chest so it’s pressing against her shoulder, his chin bumping her cheekbone.

“Ouch!” Kie exclaims at the same time as JJ mumbles, “Oh, shit!” as he tries to get a hold on the slippery glass. It’s a moment before they realise they’re almost nose-to-nose. 

There’s one shared breath. Kie’s gaze meets his. She thinks she could probably see fire in his eyes if she looked hard enough. Burning hot. Dangerous. His eyes dart down to her lips, just for a split-second but long enough for her to pay attention. 

Kie feels like she should say something to fill the silence. All that comes out of her mouth is, stupidly, “Hey.”

JJ grins, slow and sure. “Hey.”

A pause. JJ blinks. Sizing each other up. Then, a slight movement of his left hand to her waist. An invitation?

She takes it. Kie steps forward even further into his space until they’re almost chest-to-chest. She notices that there’s a smudge of engine oil across his left eyebrow, lingering even after his shower. Reaching up to gently wipe it away with her thumb, she whispers, “Missed a spot.”

JJ seems to be struck by the tenderness of the gesture. His mouth falls open and he softly sighs. “Oh.” 

There’s the faint sound of the glass JJ was holding clattering to the countertop, and then his hands are either side of her cheeks, and his mouth is on hers, and it feels like  _ oh, there you are, I’ve been waiting for you. _

The last time they kissed, it had been spontaneous and rushed. They’d been drunk. She hadn’t been thinking straight. This is different. 

It’s slow. It’s intentional. Excluding the two beers they’ve shared, they’re practically sober. This can’t be blamed on alcohol in the morning. 

He backs her up against the kitchen counter and, without detaching her lips from his, Kie hoists herself onto top of it. It’s a little damp from washing dishes and a few droplets of soapy water seep into her pants, but she doesn’t care. She’s kind of distracted. 

After a long moment of making out — in which JJ’s hands snake themselves under her shirt and unhook her bra without her really even noticing — JJ’s the one to pull back and ask, like a gentleman, “Are you sure?”

If she wasn’t sober, Kie might say something stupid right about now. Something like  _ I think I’ve been in love with you since you kissed me at John B’s party in eighth grade _ or  _ I don’t know how to be without you; tell me how to be without you? _ or  _ I miss everyone else but I think you’re my best friend. _

Instead, she looks him straight in the eyes (admires the cloudiness of the blue-grey for a second too long) and thinks about the way he’d kissed her in November. She gives him a slight nod then slides her palms under the waistband of his pants to clutch his hips and tugs him forward into another searing kiss.

Yes, she’s sure. She’s fucking terrified of what this all means, but she’s sure of these things at least — JJ’s fucking hot, she might have a little crush, and if he doesn’t start touching her  _ down there  _ like he did the week before Thanksgiving sometime soon, she might start a riot.

Settled perfectly between her legs, JJ opens his mouth to hers and tangles his hands in her hair, tilting her head back to get a better angle. His body is hot against hers. Heat falls to her stomach. Everything in her aches for him. Her hands, her hips, her thighs, her heart.

Fuck JJ Maybank and his fucking mouth.

He helps her wriggle out of all her top layers until she’s sitting half-naked on the counter, matching him in her sweatpants. JJ’s hands and his mouth are everywhere. She feels like she’s drowning in the best possible way.

Then Kie’s stupid enough to let out a soft moan — which is understandable, given the circumstances — and JJ pulls back from the kiss again to flash a shit-eating grin.

“Just friends, huh?” he teases, eyes purposefully moving up and down her body as if to say  _ really? _

Kie rolls her eyes. “You say that like  _ you’re _ not the one who kissed  _ me _ . Besides, who says we can’t be friends as well as...this?” She punctuates the last sentence with another kiss, wrapping her arms around his neck and pulling him close. 

“And what is this, then?” he asks between kisses.

“What do you mean?” she mumbles, preoccupied with the way his body is pressed up against hers.

“Us. Is this a thing _? _ ” He sounds almost serious. Shy, even. Which is crazy because — JJ Maybank? Shy? Never. 

“You’re asking me that? Right  _ now _ ?” Kie asks incredulously, gesturing to the half-dressed situation she’s got going on. Her sweater and shirt have been discarded on the floor and her bra is hanging half in the sink.

JJ lets out a strangled laugh and says, “Sorry. Fuck. Just— come here.” 

She obliges him.

At some point, after searching for a condom in the kitchen’s designated miscellaneous drawer, they stumble to the living room and onto the couch. 

Later, when he pushes into her with a soft,  _ “Fuck,”  _ it feels different than the first time. More familiar, less painful. Like everything fits where it’s supposed to. Like they’ve done this a million times.

They begin to move together, all hot skin and short breaths, and just as things start to get more frantic JJ pulls her in close for a kiss and whispers (again, like last time), “I got you.” 

It feels like a promise.

* * *

There’s no cuddling when they’re finished -- unless you count JJ’s arm slung lazily over the top of her pillow while they both stare at their phone screens. For Kie, distracting herself by scrolling mindlessly through Instagram is a perfect way for her to avoid that painfully awkward conversation of  _ so this clearly isn’t a two time thing -- what are we now? _

It’s one thing for JJ to tease her with the question while they’re in the middle of doing  _ other _ things. Another thing entirely when they’re lying naked between the sheets of JJ’s (John B and Sarah’s) bed on a chilly February evening.

She can hear JJ’s quiet breathing beside her, his chest rising and falling in a calm rhythm. She could fall asleep here just fine. JJ probably wouldn’t even mind. But that’s not what they do. That’s not who they are to each other.

(That’s what she said to herself before they kissed the first time, so that attitude obviously hasn’t quite worked out so well this far. You couldn’t catch Kie admitting that to herself, though. Not in a million years.)

“Okay, I better be going,” she says, pushing herself up onto her elbows with a sigh and swinging her bare legs over the side of the bed. “I’ve got work in the morning.”

JJ doesn’t protest her leaving. “Oh, okay,” he replies, putting his phone down and stretching his arms behind his head. He clears his throat, but his voice is still a little husky when he says, “See ya.”

She swears the trademark grin he’s got spread across his face might be hiding a twinge of disappointment, but she could be reading into things.

Then, she thinks: who cares if she is?

After she pulls her pants on and her hoodie over her head, Kie leans over the bed and plants her lips on his. It surprises him. He doesn’t kiss her back, his mouth firm and still. It doesn’t matter. The point wasn’t for them to get back into bed again -- it was just to show herself that she  _ could. _

She hopes it lets him know things are cool with them, too. That they don’t have to go through that weird  _ are we friends or are we something more? _ phase they had after the first time last year. They can accept that this is how it’s gonna be sometimes: JJ hands in her hair, her mouth on his neck, stars in their eyes. 

But they’re still gonna be JJ and Kie. Always JJ and Kie.

“Wanna do this again sometime?” JJ calls at her retreating figure as she makes her way back down the hallway to the front door, grin showing in his voice even though she can’t see him. 

She bites her lip and steps out into the cold. “In your dreams, J!”

* * *

The thing-that’s-not-a-thing happens nine more times over the next four months. 

The ninth time happens kind of by accident. 

They’re sitting in the sand at Rixon’s Cove, cooling off after a long surf — their first this season in bikinis and board shorts instead of wetsuits — when Kie confesses that she’s booked flights to Thailand and is due to be leaving in four weeks’ time. 

There is a long silence. No sound but the waves crashing onto the beach and JJ’s steady breathing. 

“Fuck. Okay,” he says after a while, eyes still trained on the rolling waves and not on her. She watches the muscles in his back ripple and tense as his jaw clenches.

“I’ll miss you,” she offers up as an olive branch of peace between them. With her absence, she knows JJ will be basically alone here in the Outer Banks. Everyone else is gone. His dad’s a piece of shit. Sure, she’ll be back in a few months, and so will the others. But that much time alone, for someone like JJ? It will be torture. Looking at him now -- at the way he sucks his lower lip under his teeth to keep from what might be crying, furrowing his brow and focusing intently on drawing patterns with his finger in the sand -- she feels a little selfish. That in her hurry to get out of here and see the world, to fulfill the plans she’s got for her life, she might be ripping something important away from him. 

It hollows out her gut and makes her reach for his hand. He takes it.

They’re hosing down in the outdoor shower at the Chateau (just a hose attached to the roof, really) when JJ kisses her. Hard. Pushed up against the side of the house, weatherboard digging into her bare back, cold water trickling into her eyes. His kiss is filled with disappointment, with longing, with anger. She kisses him back because it’s the only thing her body knows how to do when he’s close like this, touching her like this. And who knows when this will happen again? 

And so she lets herself be swept away by JJ and his inability to communicate even the simplest of his fucking feelings, lets him untie the string of her bikini and suck hickies into her skin, some in places only Kie will ever see, some in places she’s going to struggle to cover up. She thinks it’s probably intentional. She still feels faintly guilty for going through with her plans and buying those plane tickets, so she allows it from him. 

It’s rough, wet, quick. Not quite a pity-fuck, but close to it, and it seems like JJ knows it. Her legs ache when he sets her back down on the muddy ground. He still kisses her forehead before he walks inside, like he always does, letting her know things are still okay. That things won’t change. He’ll be here when she gets back, like he always is.

* * *

Almost four weeks later, she realises her period is late.

So much for Thailand, huh?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank u all so much for your continued support through kudos, comments, messages on tumblr etc. makes my heart SING every time i get a notification.
> 
> next chapter is where shit gets REAAAAAAl kie girl u don't even KNOW what's coming for u
> 
> also chap 5 will be the last chapter of kie's perspective - it switches to jj's from there on out !!


	5. totally not crying in a walmart bathroom

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> uh ohhhhh shit is hitting the faaaan lessgo
> 
> (no jj in this chapter SORRY. but so much kie x sarah. in another universe, THEY'RE the ones in love. they have so much chemistry i almost start to write them as if they're in love i just can't HELP it. so instead i tried to write them as having the most beautiful of best girl friend loves n i hope that translates haha)
> 
> also, songs of the chapter (bc that's a thing i'm doing now): 'changes' by antonio williams and kerry mccoy, 'napster' by jean dawson, ‘circle the drain’ by soccer mommy. do yourselves a favour and listen while reading

Kiara’s been vomiting every morning for a week.

It fucking _sucks._ And not only because it totally blows having the smell of rancid vomit in your nose for hours after an up-chuck, but because she knows, deep down, what it means.

Her period’s late. Two weeks, to be exact.

It’s happened before, sure. She once even had the opposite problem and got her period twice in the space of a month. But Kie’s a smart girl. She can put two and two together. Unprotected sex + missed period + morning sickness = high likeliness of a tiny gremlin baby growing inside her. 

Even when she’s not throwing up last night’s dinner into the toilet bowl in her bathroom, she feels sick to her stomach. She can barely concentrate at work. It’s finally June and the swell is pumping down at Rixon’s, but Kie ignores every text JJ sends asking if she wants to go for a surf. There’s absolutely no way she can have fun -- let alone see _JJ_ \-- when she feels as shit as she does.

She can’t bring herself to take a pregnancy test. At least not on her own. Kie decides she’ll wait for Sarah to come home for the summer -- Sarah, John B and Pope are all due to arrive home in three days’ time -- to work up the courage to buy one. 

Like they had when they’d all come home for Christmas, the Pogues (plus Sarah) organise a get-together at the Chateau to celebrate the coming of summer. They make burgers, have a few drinks (Kie discreetly makes herself a “gin and tonic” without the gin), enjoy the sun that’s still up at eight o’clock. There’s talk of Pope’s crazy lab experiments, Sarah’s top grades, John B’s first news story, JJ’s encounters with crackheads coming into the shop and trying to sell stolen cars. Eventually, they get around to talking about Kie -- something she had avoided for the past couple hours on account of that late period and the simple fact that it’s virtually impossible for her to lie to Sarah if such a leading question was asked.

They’re sitting around outside drinking on the hammocks when John B says, “Hey, Kie! I hear you’re headed to Thailand next week!” He smiles, pointing his bottle in her direction and raising his eyebrows in approval. “That’s cool as shit.”

Oh. Fuck. Yeah, Thailand. That’s right. Well, there’s still a chance that she’s not pregnant, so if she says that she’s still going, that won’t exactly be lying, right? And if she is pregnant...that’s something to think about another time. Her voice cracks slightly when she replies, “Yeah.” She clears her throat and continues. “Yeah, it’s cool. Finally, right?” Kie forces out a laugh, and everyone grins but JJ. He’s tucked into a hammock with Pope, nursing a beer, shadows from the overhanging tree’s leaves obscuring half his face. The other half looks very broody. She avoids eye contact and swallows hard.

“Can we move into your place while you’re away instead of staying here?” John B continues, although his voice now feels far away and fuzzy as Kie’s focus drifts. “It stinks of JJ. And I don’t wanna sleep on that bed again knowing what he’s probably been doing in it.”

Next to her on their hammock, Sarah coughs violently into her drink. It jolts Kie back into the present. “Ha. Yeah,” she laughs nervously. “No, thanks.”

The boys go back to talking amongst themselves. Kie jabs Sarah in the ribs to get her attention then whispers, “I need to talk to you. Privately.”

Kie can see Sarah’s eyes go wide even in the shadowy evening light. “Is this about…” she jerks her head in JJ’s direction. Kie, tired of keeping every goddamn thing to do with JJ a secret, sighs and nods.

“Uh, Kie and I are gonna go refill our drinks,” Sarah announces to the boys, climbing out of the hammock with Kie close beside her. The three boys, stuck into a conversation about Pope’s new car, don’t seem to notice or care. 

Kie follows Sarah into the kitchen and leans against the counter while Sarah makes a beeline for the alcohol cupboard -- the top shelf that houses all the half-drunk bottles of gin and rum. Grabbing a bottle of Bacardi and a bottle of soda water from the fridge, Sarah begins to make herself what looks like a mojito with some sprigs of mint and a squeeze of lemon leftover from the boys’ drinks (a Corona with a wedge of lemon is better than sex, according to John B). 

“Oh, you’re really getting another drink?” Kie asks. “I thought that was just a lie to get the boys out of our hair.”

“No, I need another,” Sarah smiles. “Especially if you’re about to tell me something unbelievably juicy about you and JJ. You want one?” She tips her glass at Kie and raises a brow. There’s still a few more minutes left of golden sunset light and it spills through the blinds and onto Sarah’s hair, still dyed bright blonde from last winter. The light makes her look like she had a halo. Kie swallows down her nervousness and smiles.

“No, thanks,” Kie replies, trying her best to appear nonchalant so her ever-observant friend won’t press for more information. Unfortunately, this is Sarah Cameron she’s talking about, and Sarah Cameron leaves no secret undiscovered.

“Really?” Sarah frowns. “I’m great at making cocktails. I used to make them for all my dad’s friends when I was little. That-- sounds weird,” she pauses, scrunching up her nose. Kie giggles. “I promise it’s not. _Anyway_. You sure?”

Kie clears her throat and prepares herself for what’s sure to be a barrage of questions. She’s already feeling sick. “I’m sure. I’m not exactly...drinking alcohol right now.”

“Uh, and why the fuck not? Are you pregnant or something?” she says with a laugh, like it’s the only logical reason why someone wouldn’t want to drink. It’s meant to be a joke, but Sarah doesn’t know how accurate it is. Kie feels like a deer in the headlights, frozen in her spot, her insides turning to jelly. Catching the colour fading from her best friend’s face, Sarah’s eyes go wide, clearly realising what Kie’s silence has implied. “Oh, Kie. Oh _, Kie!_ ”

“Keep your voice down,” Kie groans, feeling like she could throw up with anxiety at any moment. “And I’m not pregnant. At least, I think I’m not. I just missed my period this month. It’s nothing--”

And here’s where the shitstorm starts. “Are you fucking _kidding_ me right now?! Kie! What the fuck!” Sarah hisses, almost dropping the glass she’s holding. “Explain!”

Deciding she needs to sit down for this, Kie makes her way to the living room and slouches down into her favourite armchair before answering. “I slept with JJ again like three or four weeks ago,” she says in a low voice. A blush creeps up over her neck and her cheeks. She glances over her shoulder to the backyard to make sure the boys can’t hear, but they’re thankfully further enough away that that won’t be a problem. Sarah takes a seat on the couch next to her, already gulping down her mojito at record pace. “We didn’t use protection. Which is fucking stupid in retrospect, but it seemed okay at the time. We weren’t even planning on doing anything, it just happened. And now my period’s late, and I’ve been throwing up every morning for the past week, and I think I might need to take a pregnancy test.” Everything comes out as word-vomit, her tongue feeling all rubbery and useless in her mouth. 

Sarah just stares at her, mouth open in shock. “Oh my God. _Oh_ my _God_. But wait— you and JJ...this has been happening on the regular?”

“Uh, well…”

“ _Kie!_ ” Sarah whisper-screams, throwing her arms in the air in exasperation and evidently forgetting she’s holding a drink. A splash of liquid falls onto her white tank top, but Sarah doesn’t even notice. “No way. Is it just a friends-with-benefits kinda thing or are you, like, together? C’mon, tell me,” she whines, flashing Kie melty puppy-dog eyes. “My dating life isn’t as exciting as yours. Give me the _drama_.”

“Fine,” Kie concedes, sinking back into the chair cushions. “I don’t know what we are. We’re definitely not together, but we’re not _not_ together either...We’ve never really talked about it. It always seems to just— _happen._ ”

“Oh my God,’ Sarah says breathily, taking another sip of her cocktail. “This is so romantic.”

“It’s not fucking romantic, Sarah!” Kie hisses, crossing her arms over her chest. “It’s terrible! This is a terrible situation! Remember the potential pregnancy thing?”

“Oh, yeah, of course that’s terrible,” Sarah frowns, waving a hand in front of her face. “I just got caught up in the story of you and JJ bumpin’ uglies and fallin’ in love.”

“That is _not_ what is happening here, Sarah,” Kie says, rolling her eyes.

“Sure, Jan. Whatever.” Sarah drains the rest of her drink -- Kie’s got no idea how she finished it so fast -- and leans forward to rest her elbows on her knees. “Okay, so,” she whispers conspiratorially. “What are you gonna do?"

Kie rubs a tired hand over her face. “A pregnancy test, I guess? And the boys can’t know, so don’t go spreading this around to John B.”

Now it’s Sarah’s turn to roll her eyes. Kie is mildly put off by how easily Sarah is taking this. “Obviously. You free tomorrow? Let’s go to Walmart. If we go to the mainland it’s less likely we’ll bump into someone we know who will start asking questions.”

And that’s...actually some good common sense. “Good idea. Fuck. This is insane.” Kie rests her head in her hands and pushes her hands through her hair, tugging exasperatedly on the dark curls. 

Sarah clambers out of her seat and over to Kie, flopping down on the arm of the chair and tucking herself into Kie’s side. She presses a kiss to Kie’s hair then says in a sing-song-y kind of voice, “Mama Sarah’s here to help you, Kiara my girl.” Then, in a more serious tone that makes Kie sit heavy in her chest, “It’s gonna be alright. And hey, maybe the test will come back negative, huh?”

* * *

The test did not come back negative.

Neither did the second, or the third, or the fourth test Kie took in the slimy customer’s bathroom in Walmart. 

They’ve been in here for almost an hour now. Kie’s drunk enough water to fill a swimming pool. With every positive test, her stomach sinks lower and lower.

“Get me another test,” Kie orders as she dumps the fourth positive test into the trash can and reaches for the half-gallon bottle of water they’d bought earlier (along with two boxes of pregnancy tests). Sarah sits up on the counter with her long, tanned legs kicking against the tiles, sipping on a smoothie. 

“Are you sure you want to get rid of those?” Sarah asks, gesturing to the trash can full of discarded tests. 

Kie ignores her question and then says, puffing like she’s run a marathon instead of just chugging water, “I need to try again.”

“You’ve taken four already, Kiara,” Sarah replies, watching Kie dig through her pockets to find some extra cash for another test with what Kie feels like is a whole lot of pity in her eyes. “It’s okay, Kie. It’s going to be okay,” she says softly, like calming down an angry child, and it’s what makes Kie break.

“No!” Kie explodes. “It’s _not_ going to be okay, Sarah!” She throws her hands up in the air and shouts as loud as is appropriate when in a public bathroom. “I’m fucking _pregnant!_ ” 

Saying the word out loud is a whole new experience than just seeing those double lines. A breath catches in Kie’s throat. Tears threaten her eyes. She swallows them back down. No crying here. Not while wearing her favourite old Bob Marley and the Wailers band tee, because now it’s gonna have bad memories attached to it. And not in a fucking Walmart bathroom.

“This could be like a blessing or something though, right?” Sarah says, tossing her empty smoothie cup in the trash and sliding off of the counter. She steps closer to Kie and rests her hands on Kie’s shoulders. “Like, everything happens for a reason?”

Kie looks her straight in the eye and grits her teeth. “Why are you saying that like it’s a question?”

“I don’t know? I’m trying to be positive?” Sarah says, trying to force a smile. Upon seeing Kie’s stormy gaze, the smile drops along with her hands from Kie’s shoulders. “Fuck. It’s not working, is it?”

Exhaling hard, Kie turns to brace her hands on the side of the sink, leaning against it with a groan. “Sarah, I’m gonna die. I’m seriously gonna die.”

“No, you’re not.” Sarah puts her hand on Kie’s back, but Kie shrugs her off, turning the tap instead and beginning to splash cold water on her face, hoping it’ll shock the fear that’s rising up in her throat out of her system. 

“I am. I’m either going to die of a heart attack right now or my dad is going to kill me.” Kie’s getting water all over her shirt, but she doesn’t care. “This is terrible.”

“It’s not—“

“I’m nineteen, I live with my parents, I barely have a full time job, and the father of this baby is fucking _JJ Maybank_.” Kie whirls around to face Sarah, teeth bared, water dripping from her chin, chest rising and falling with quick, short breaths.

Sarah’s eyes go wide. She grabs some paper towels from the dispenser next to the sink and steps forward to gingerly wipe the liquid off of Kie’s face. Kie wants to cry. “Woah, okay, yeah, but...we love JJ,” Sarah soothes, voice little more than a soft hum. Kie closes her eyes and sighs. “JJ’s cool.”

“Not ‘baby daddy’ cool, Sarah!” Kie replies, feeling that red hot panic returning to burn up her lungs. “He’s— he’s— completely incapable of being a father. He still thinks fart jokes are the height of comedy. He’s not going to want to be involved at all—”

“Hey, stop,” Sarah commands, sharper now. She dumps the used towels in the trash and turns back to grab Kie’s shoulders again, giving her a little shake. “You don’t know that. I think you need to give him a little credit. And let me pull you back from the precipice you’re about to fall off of and bring you back to the real world.” Sarah picks up her bag and slides her pink oversized sunglasses down onto her nose. “C’mon,” she says, grabbing Kie’s cold hand in her warm one. “I’ll buy you a coffee.”

Kie allows herself to be pulled out of the bathroom by the arm, Vans scuffing on the dirty tiles. She briefly notes that her shoelace is untied, but can’t find it in her to care. “Am I allowed to drink coffee when I’m pregnant?” she asks, her voice feeling kind of far away. _Pregnant._ That’s a thing she is now. Shit.

“I don’t know,” Sarah replies as they make their way out of the winding hallway and back into the main part of the store. “I think so? Probably. We can get decaf just in case.”

* * *

Sarah drops Kie home in the late afternoon, then ends up staying for dinner after some good-natured insistence from Kie’s mom. 

Kie fakes feeling sick straight after they eat, and it allows Kie and Sarah to retreat to Kie’s bedroom without arousing suspicion, or getting told off by Kie’s dad for not sitting and interacting with the family. She’s definitely not in the mood for that right now. 

She has no idea how her parents will handle this when they inevitably find out.

Actually, no. Kie knows how it will go down. Her dad will throw a fit, probably threaten to kick her out of the house or get JJ arrested or some shit like that, and her mom will almost blow a casket trying to get him to calm down. But her mom will likely try to be awkwardly supportive. Might leave a pamphlet on her bed from the local family planning clinic that tells Kie about all the _options_ she has, all the decisions she has to make about what’s going to happen to the kid.

And oh, the options. So many options.

Kie and Sarah lie spread out on Kie’s bed, limbs entangled, Sarah carefully braiding Kie’s hair like they used to do during sleepovers when they were thirteen or fourteen years old. 

“What are you gonna do, Kie?” Sarah asks, gently dragging her nails across Kie’s scalp while she braids, sending Kie almost to sleep.

“I...don’t know.”

Kie is pro-choice through and through. But when it’s your own body? Your own kid? Things are way more fucking complicated, even if she doesn’t want them to be. 

(The fact that it’s _JJ’s_ kid complicates things even further. Kie doesn’t want to think about what that really means.)

She’s not exactly sure what she’ll do, but Kie has a feeling, right in the space between her heart and her ribcage, that this might be a forever thing. That she might not be able to give this kid up, one way or the other. 

Mostly because it’s JJ’s kid, too. And despite all the shit Kie spouted earlier about him not being cut out to be a parent, JJ would be a great dad, especially since his own father is such a piece of work. He’d do everything in his power to make sure their kid gets the childhood he never had. He would be so good. She can’t take that away from him without at least conferring with him about it first.

She needs to talk to him. But not before she figures out what to do with Thailand. She remembers with a start that she was meant to be leaving for the tropical country in three days’ time, and hasn’t done anything about cancelling the flights.

“Fuck. Thailand,” Kie groans, sitting up from Sarah’s lap. Sarah frowns and it takes a while before she realises what Kie’s talking about. “I’ve already paid for my flights. I don’t know if they’re refundable or not. I was meant to be leaving next week. Fuck!” Kie flops headfirst into a pillow and screams into the fluff. 

“You’ve had more important shit to worry about. It’s okay,” Sarah says softly, tracing calming circles onto Kie’s back. “I’ll sort it out for you.”

“Sarah—“

“Kie, shut up. Calling the travel agent is the _least_ I can do.”

“What am I supposed to tell the boys?” Kie asks, twisting her head to the side so her voice isn’t muffled by the pillow. “My parents?”

“Well, you should probably tell JJ about _this_ sooner rather than later. But everyone else? I don’t know. Just say you decided to postpone the trip for a while because you wanted to spend the summer with us.”

The way Sarah says it makes it sound so easy. Kie wishes the reality matched her optimism. 

For a long time, they sit in silence as Sarah continues to draw lazy shapes on Kie’s t-shirt clad back. It’s so comforting and warm and familiar that Kie drifts into that lovely, dozy space between wide awake and the edge of sleep.

Then Sarah asks Kie something that halfway breaks her heart. “Do you like him?”

“I don’t want to.” And that’s not a lie.

“But you do, huh?”

Kie’s silence is as much of an answer as any.

Which is fucking frustrating, because Kiara is not an idiot.

She knows she’s not the only girl JJ’s sleeping with.

She sees the Instagram stories from parties he attends while she works the evening shift at The Wreck, all posted by the girls from school she still follows for some unknown reason. He’s always photographed with someone’s arm around his waist, someone’s cheek pressed against his when squishing in for a blurry photo, some girl’s hand on his bicep. 

And really, who does she have to blame but herself? JJ’s the one who asked her if they were a _thing_ or not, and she always vehemently denied it. Just friends. Friends who sleep together sometimes. That was all it was ever supposed to be. So the girls shouldn’t phase her. 

They really shouldn’t.

Except now her feelings on those other girls are more complicated because she’s carrying JJ’s fucking _baby._

And she’s got no real, concrete idea of what she’s gonna do, or how this whole thing is going to play out. Even the pure _idea_ of pregnancy and birthing a baby scares her. Sarah forced her to watch that birthing documentary series _One Born Every Minute_ one time, and Kie saw things that have scarred her for life. 

Having a baby with someone is a big deal. You’re bringing a whole other _human being_ into the world. And that human being is supposed to be made out of love and trust and commitment.

She doesn’t love JJ.

Not like that.

Love is supposed to be romantic walks on the beach and dinner dates at fancy restaurants on the mainland, right? Not this messy, fucked up, call-in-the-middle-of-the-night, only-honest-when-we’re-drunk kind of thing. 

It’s not love.

It’s _not._ It can’t ever be. That’s not how life works. 

But whatever Kie eventually decides, she knows JJ deserves to know. He deserves to be a part of the process. She can’t forget that he’s still her best friend. That over the past half a year, he’s been the most consistent person in her life. 

He needs to know.

When Sarah eventually slips out the door later that night, Kie knows what she needs to do before falling asleep. She takes her phone and opens her messages, then searches for JJ’s name. The last text he’d sent her a few days ago had read: _surf’s good today. you keen? i can pick you up at 3._ She’d never replied.

With shaking hands, Kie types out a message to JJ and clicks send.

 **11:24pm - kie:** we need to talk. meet me down at the docks tomorrow at 6.

Kie turns her phone off so she doesn’t have to see the reply until tomorrow, then closes her blinds, turns off her light, and begs her brain to quiet down enough so she can sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and that's the end of kie's perspective! i've so loved getting in her head to write but i am so excited to switch to our boy jj........oh man this is so fun
> 
> also i am 1 billion% inserting myself into sarah's character. sorry not sorry. i lov her
> 
> i'm so happy ya'll are enjoying this fic! i hope this story is bringing you some joy in these crazy times. stay safe everyone. i love ya'll. sending love to my american friends from new zealand (i know every society in every country, including my own, is just as rotten as the other and systematic change is needed in so many areas, but i also know america is hurting so much rn and needs it the most. love you all)


	6. it's not a booty call, i promise! it's so much worse than that!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is unedited and it's late so if there's any spelling mistakes or whatever i'll deal with it in the morning lol i just wanted to get this out bc i'm EMOTIONAL
> 
> songs of the chapter: 'steamroller' by phoebe bridgers, 'lamb's wool' by foster the people, and (although it only started playing as i'm typing this rn but it so fits) 'chewing cotton wool' by the japanese house.
> 
> prepare for BIG NEWS

The boys are camped out in Pope’s basement playing Call of Duty and eating their weight in Doritos when the text comes through. 

_ We need to talk. _

What the fuck does  _ that _ mean?

JJ’s high off half a joint and feeling dizzy already -- this just makes his head swim even more.

John B catches JJ staring at his phone with his nose all scrunched up in confusion.

“Who’s texting you this late at night, huh?”

Distracted, JJ replies, ”It’s, uh, it’s Kiara.”

“ _ Oh _ , so this is a  _ booty call _ , right. Uh huh,” John B sniggers, getting up from his seat on one of the three musty old beanbags that have lived in this basement for what’s probably decades and reaching over in an attempt to grab JJ’s phone. Pope watches them carefully, not saying anything.

“Shut up, JB,” JJ grumbles, keeping his phone out of John B’s reach -- who is  _ way  _ too high right now, by the way. The kid’s got the tolerance of a worm. “That’s not what’s going on here.” What he really wants to say, as he stares at his cracked iPhone 5’s screen, is:  _ this isn’t a booty call! It’s so much worse than that! _

JJ and Kie don’t  _ do _ talking. Especially not this late at night. 

He has no idea what she wants. He kind of doesn’t want to find out, because she might want to yell at him about something he’s done and Kie’s fucking terrifying when she gets mad. Her eyes go all dark and her mouth twists up into a biting frown, and she never pulls her punches, just says it how it is. Calls him out on his bullshit, all the damn time.

JJ wracks his brain to try and figure out what he may have said or did to make Kiara send him such a text at this time of night.

He comes up with nothing substantial, really: she never responded to his text about surfing the other day. Does she want to tell him she doesn’t wanna surf with him anymore? Or maybe it’s the fact that he forgot to pay her back for the Subway sandwich she bought him last week. It was only $5 though, so surely she can’t be mad at that.

There’s a chance it’s about this weird but kind of awesome fuck-buddy relationship they’ve had going on over the past half a year, but JJ doesn’t wanna think about that one too hard in the presence of the boys. Pope’s so fucking observant, he’d probably guess it right away.

_ Have you been fucking Kie? _

_ What? Pope, how’d you know? _

_ I can see it on your face. Plus, you smell like her laundry detergent. _

_ That’s fuckin’ weird, Pope. _

Ah, shit, and now he’s having imaginary conversations with his best friend. Anyway, no, he’s not telling them.

Pope thankfully pulls him out of his own head before JJ starts spiralling by handing him the joint they’d been sharing. “You look like you need some of this,” Pope says with an eyebrow raised, and JJ wonders when they’d ever switched roles. 

Pope’s chilled out so much as they’ve grown older, but JJ still found it strange when he saw Pope roll a joint for the first time. He takes it and sucks in a long drag, holding it in his mouth before exhaling slowly. Everything feels better. He presses the power-off button on his phone and tucks it back into the pocket of his shorts. John B, having grown tired of trying to steal JJ’s phone away from him, is loudly crunching his way through a bag of chips.

“Was it anything serious?” Pope asks tentatively.

JJ thinks for a moment about telling the truth -- that Kie and him had been fucking around with each other for the past half a year and that the text might be related to that. But then that would mean explaining their friends-with-benefits relationship that neither of the boys would probably understand, and then John B would probably go and tell Sarah, and then Pope might get all embarrassed and weird about it because JJ’s  _ pretty _ sure he’s over his crush on Kie, but then again, Pope never talks about her when she’s not around so he can’t be certain about that one.

He inhales more sweet smoke then passes the joint back to Pope. “Nope,” he says finally.

Pope raises his eyebrows but doesn’t say anything more, except to scold John B for touching the PlayStation controls with his icky Dorito-dust fingers. JJ leans back into the comfortable beanbag and stares straight at the TV screen as John B tries -- and fails -- to complete his current mission. 

He’s not really watching the game, though. He’s thinking of tomorrow and all the drama -- or, hopefully, lack thereof -- that it might hold.

_ Girls, man,  _ he thinks to himself.  _ Fuckin’ girls. _

* * *

When JJ and John B arrive back at the Chateau, Sarah’s car is in the driveway. She must have returned from Kie’s place while the boys had been gone. JJ can’t help his mind from straying to the thought that Sarah and Kie might have talked about him, seeing as their hanging-out coincided with the text that was sent this evening. He’s not sure how he feels about that.

John B slips quietly into his old bedroom where a sleepy Sarah is likely waiting — if she hasn’t fallen asleep already, as it’s well past midnight — with a nod goodnight to JJ. The door closes at John B’s back, and within a few seconds JJ hears the rustling of sheets and soft murmurs of whispered greetings and goodnights.

Kicking off his shoes at the front door, JJ makes his way to the couch-bed, where he’s been relegated for the night (and probably the rest of the summer, too). He doesn’t mind. This is John B’s place, after all. And besides, the couch-bed isn’t so uncomfortable. It’s where he slept for the first couple months last fall before Kie forced him to take the big room. 

All he wants is to fall straight asleep and to stop thinking about what Kie meant by  _ we need to talk. _ He’s dreading meeting up with her tomorrow. 

Staring at the ceiling while laying awake, JJ rationalises that the worst thing she could say would be that she didn’t wanna fuck him anymore. He can handle that. It’s not like he  _ likes _ her, or anything. She’s his best friend, and they’ve just been having a bit of fun over the past...well, half a year. There’s not too many girls in the Outer Banks that he can handle sleeping with then hanging out with the next day. It’s been nice. But if she decides to cut him off, he’ll be okay with it. There are always other girls. More fish in the sea, and all that bullshit.

Besides, it’s summer. The tourons are descending upon the Banks, horny, suntanned, and flushed with daddy’s money — and he’s never had any trouble getting with tourons. Nah. If that’s what Kie wants to talk to him about, he’ll be just fine.

But then thinking about Kie gets him thinking about the first time he kissed her, way back last year. And maybe it’s the weed still in his system or the tiredness that presses at his eyelids, but his heart constricts a little when he thinks of that night.

He’d been ballsy as fuck to suggest that card game. He could blame it on the alcohol he’d been drinking at the time, but really -- he kind of just wanted to see Kie naked. Or maybe not even naked. Just-- he’d always wondered what it would be like to have her look at him like he wasn’t just her friend. (Like the way he’d been looking at her for fucking  _ years _ , but he’s not gonna get into that right now.) He never expected that she’d say yes to the game, even knowing she was shit at card games and was likely to lose.

His gut gets all twisted up when remembering how she’d looked when she pulled off her shirt, grinned at him, climbed into his lap for a kiss. And then the way she’d touched him, and he’d touched her, feeling the silkiness of her tanned skin sliding under his palms, her hands in his hair.  _ Fuck, _ and how it had been when they’d finally got to the bedroom after making out on the couch for so long. He grits his teeth just thinking about it.

Okay, so maybe he’ll be a little disappointed if Kie tells him tomorrow she wants to call it all off.

But only because he’d be missing out on good sex, alright? Nothing else.  _ Definitely _ nothing else.

* * *

She’s half an hour late.

He knows because he arrives exactly at 6:00pm and checks his phone for the time every three minutes. She pulls up in her dad’s black SUV as he’s scrolling half-heartedly through his Instagram. He shoves his phone in his pocket as soon as she steps out of the car.

The first thought he has -- stupidly, like he’s got a monkey brain -- is,  _ fuck, she looks good. _ Kie’s hair is in pretty braids, all tied up behind her head with one of her signature headbands, and she’s wearing a white tank top and the same pair of linen pants she’d worn the night they first kissed. JJ kind of hates the way he notices things like that. Makes him feel soft.

He pushes himself off the beam he’s resting his back against and steps forward into the middle of the gazebo, watching her as she silently trudges down the path to the edge of the water.

“Hey, Kie,” he says when she’s close enough for him to whisper it and for her to hear. His voice comes out wobblier than expected. Fuck, he’s nervous. He’s not sure why he feels this way. Only knows he doesn’t like the way her mouth twists up into a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes.

Kie comes to stand in front of him, awkward, hands at her sides. She looks beautiful. And sad. Maybe a little fearful. He doesn’t know why she’d be afraid, especially since  _ she _ was the one who called him here to talk, and probably isn’t the one who had laid awake for most of the night thinking about this moment.

“Hey, JJ,” Kie replies, squinting across at him against the sun that’s just dipped low enough to shine from under the edge of the gazebo roof. 

He wishes there was a spot to sit down. He figures they could probably sit at the edge of the dock, right by the ladder that leads down into the murky estuary water, but Kie doesn’t make a move to go anywhere. That’s probably an indication that this isn’t going to be a long conversation.

JJ’s got his hands in his pockets, fiddling with the lighter in one and his phone in the other, when Kie sighs and says, “I might as well get right to it. I’m, uh--” She pauses and clears her throat, her gaze sliding off of his face and to the side of him, focusing on something he can’t see. He watches her jaw clench and unclench a few times. She reaches up to twist one of the braids that fall free from her ponytail around her finger, fidgeting, just like he is. He waits. 

Then she’s opening her mouth to speak, and JJ’s heart falls to his stomach, because the words she says -- confidently, resolutely, without-a-doubt -- are, “I’m pregnant.”

“ _ Fuck,” _ he says dumbly, drawing out the vowel so his jaw hangs slack. He realises very quickly that this is most definitely the wrong reaction because Kie’s eyes snap back to meet his, the dark brown of her irises clouding over in anger. And maybe a little of that fear he saw earlier. Her hands ball into fists, clenching and unclenching like her jaw was doing earlier, and JJ thinks he sees her fingers shake.

“It’s yours,” Kie says, deadpan, almost savage, dropping a bomb. 

“I figured,” he replies, barely able to get the words out. He wishes the wooden decking would open him up and swallow him whole. Anything to get away from the way Kie’s looking at him right now, like he’s just stolen all the important parts of her life away from her; her independence, her dream to travel, her body, her choice in who she loves. That’s his first thought, really -- not how this affects him, but Kie -- and it might say something about the way he feels about his best friend, but he’s not sure.

There’s a part of him that isn’t quite connected to his body right now that thinks it’s so strange to be having this kind of conversation at the dock where they launch the HMS Pogue every day in the summer, where he’s grown up diving for cockle shells and learning how to backflip into the water. Right outside the Chateau. If John B and Sarah were home right now instead of at dinner with Wheezie, they could look right out the front window in the living room and see Kie and JJ standing down here under the gazebo. It feels private and soul-baring all at once. 

“I haven’t decided what I want to do with it yet. I’ll let you know,” she says, still looking at him with that odd expression on her face, like this is a business transaction or a decision on where to go for dinner, not about the fate of their fucking _ baby. _ He can’t be mad at her, though. She’s just protecting herself. He’d do the same in her position.

“When did you find out?” he asks, surprising himself at how small his voice sounds. 

“Yesterday.”

“Oh.” He’d like to touch her somehow. Maybe hug her, or just brush his hand against her cheek, anything that gives him skin-to-skin contact, because it’s what calms him in situations where it feels like the world is falling apart. He’s always been a physical touch person. Never needed Sarah forcing him to do a Love Languages test to know that. It’s why he likes to fight, likes to kiss his friends on their cheeks, likes to sleep with all of them in John B’s bed on nights when they’re too drunk to drive home because the touch grounds him, makes him feel loved. It’s probably why it hurts so much when his dad hits him.

He wants Kiara’s touch now, but keeps his hands in his pockets, forcing himself to stay still. Kie looks so uncharacteristically scared. It’s like if he says something that freaks her out, she’ll bolt. And he doesn’t want her to leave.

“How far...along are you?” JJ asks, the words sounding strange in his mouth.  _ Far along? _ Like it would even matter. He knows when the last time they had sex was. Remembers it well. Under the outside shower at the Chateau after a surf, after she told him she was leaving. He was so mad at her for leaving, and so bitterly sad. It had felt good to kiss her rough underneath the spray of the water, taste the salt on her lips, have her fingernails digging into his back. 

He also remembers forgetting a fucking condom. Idiot.  _ Idiot. _

“Three weeks? Four?” 

Four. It’s been four. Twenty-seven days, to be exact. Not that he was counting.

Overwhelmed, he steps forward and reaches out to touch her hand, but she pulls away before he can. “Kie—“ 

“I’m going home,” she says in a low, husky voice that JJ thinks is hiding tears. Turning on her heel, she makes her way back to the car. He doesn’t follow. “I’ll see you later,” she calls over her shoulder as she climbs back into the driver’s seat, putting the gear in reverse and not meeting his eyes. She doesn’t specify when  _ later _ will be. He doesn’t ask. 

JJ watches her leave with a hollowness in this throat that spreads to his lungs, his heart, the pit of his stomach, the tips of his fingers. He has the sinking feeling that this might not be the only time he looks on as Kie leaves him.

He opens his mouth to call her name but by the time sound comes out — a wretched, throaty “ _ Kie!” _ — she’s long gone, the dust settling on the road. 

Suddenly, the world feels very big and very small at the exact same time. He feels like he can’t breathe. There’s a weight on his chest, and he can’t breathe. He pinches the soft skin of the inside of his wrist to remind himself that this is real, this is happening, Kiara is driving away from him and she’s got his  _ baby _ growing inside of her and it’s probably the size of a peanut right now but soon it’s going to be a real life baby and he’s not cut out for this, he doesn’t know the first thing about being a father, he—

He pulls out his phone with shaking hands and sends a text to the group chat he shares with John B and Pope (the one the girls don’t know about) that reads:

**6:43pm - jj:** hey so i need to get completely fucking wasted tonight. don’t ask questions.

**6:46pm - john b:** should we invite sarah and kie?

**6:47pm - jj:** why do you think i’m using this group chat? no girls. just us

**6:48pm - pope:** Is everything okay?

_ 6:50pm / seen by JJ Maybank _

Today is the twenty-first of June, the longest day of the year. And it fucking feels it.

* * *

The three boys do get absolutely fucking wasted out on the HMS Pogue that night.

Well, JJ does, at least. Pope never likes to get that drunk and John B has the responsibility of driving the boat, so it’s really just JJ stumbling over his words and his feet when they eventually get back to land.

Neither of the boys ask JJ what’s up. They know better than to pry into his personal life. They probably think it’s something about his dad, or work, or whatever. They’d never guess it’s because Kiara Carrera is pregnant with his fucking  _ baby. _

Pope pats him on the shoulder when JJ and John B drop him off at his place, and he looks at JJ with those all-knowing dark eyes that say more than words ever could. But if Pope, or anyone else, asks JJ if he’s okay right now, while his vision is blurry and his mind is even hazier, he’ll probably implode, so JJ shrugs Pope’s hand away and flicks him the fake grin he’s perfected for times like these.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” JJ calls as Pope retreats into the house, his tongue fumbling the consonants. They’ve planned to go surfing at Rixon’s in the morning before work. Pope waves his agreement and disappears into the house.

“Let’s get you home now, huh, big guy?” John B jokes, shuffling JJ back into Twinkie, oblivious to his best friend’s plight as ever. 

When they get back into the house, John B pours JJ a glass of ice water to sober him up and watches him drink it before heading to bed, where Sarah is already sleeping. JJ figures he should probably go to bed too, as the clock on the wall says it’s well past eleven o’clock and he’s supposed to be getting up at dawn for the surf, but he’s not tired. Even while drunk, his brain won’t shut up.

He forgoes brushing his teeth, feeling too sick to bother with keeping himself clean, and falls into bed with his socks still on.

Now that he’s still, lying here on the couch-bed with a blanket wrapped comfortingly around him, he has time to process. 

Kiara is pregnant. With his baby.

His  _ baby. _

He’s gonna be a dad. Already  _ is _ a father, if he believes all the pro-lifers who say a life begins at conception. If she goes through with the birth and decides to keep it -- which she may not even choose to do -- he’ll become responsible for an entirely new human life. Forever. Despite what his dad might think or act like, parenthood doesn’t end when a kid’s old enough to talk back. It’s a lifelong thing. 

This is never how he saw his life going. It’s definitely not how Kie would have seen hers, either.

Kie was never made to stay in the Banks. She belongs in the jungles of Southeast Asia, in the back of a pickup truck on a dusty Australian highway, in the sweltering heat of Abu Dhabi, walking the streets of New York City. Not here. Not with him. 

She’ll leave eventually, just like everyone else. JJ  _ knows  _ this.

And he doesn’t think that in a self-deprecating way. It’s not meant to be sad, or disappointing, or pitying. It’s just the way his life’s rolled so far, and he’s fine with it. He’s good at being a lone wolf, always looking out for himself. 

And besides, it’s not like he  _ owns _ Kie. 

He doesn’t control where she goes, who she hangs out with, what she does with her body. At the end of the day, even though this baby is as much his as it is hers, it’s her choice what happens with it. He’ll support her whatever she chooses, and whether she decides to stay or not. 

(That doesn’t mean there’s not an embarrassingly big part of him that hopes, dreams, prays that she’ll stay.)

Moonlight settles over the living room, bathing everything in a cold grey. JJ hasn’t closed the blinds. He never does. He always liked sleeping with the nightlight on, even after his dad used to beat him for being a pussy who was scared of the dark. Well, when the dark’s full of monsters that sounded like his dad and hit with fists that left bruises, nightlights came in handy. And now, though he’s nineteen, it’s become a habit to keep a light on when sleeping. 

The grainy silver light shines on the wall of Routledge family photos that sit above the couch JJ is laid flat on. John B’s been gone for almost a year, yet JJ hasn’t touched a thing in this house. Has never replaced any of the photos on the walls, even though John B said he was free to buy his own furniture and make the place his own. Kie offered once to take him to an Ikea on the mainland, but JJ never took her up on it. It felt — still feels — almost wrong to change the way the house looks. Like it would be an insult to Big John, JJ’s stand-in father for too many fucking years, who built this tiny crabshack of a house with his own hands way back when he was a teenager. 

(Maybe there’s also a part of him that believes that if he keeps things the same way they’ve always been, like John B never left, then his best friend will come home every summer and be reminded of all the good memories he’d shared with JJ in this stinking little house. And maybe he would want to stay. For good, this time. It’s an impossible thought. JJ has kept the pictures up, just in case.)

He looks up at the photos, tucking the blanket under his chin. He can just make out the smiling face of Big John, standing with his arm around John B’s shoulders. John B couldn’t be more than eight in the picture, holding a fish bigger than his head with both hands, grinning so childlike-bright and big. 

His fuzzy, beer-addled brain studies the pictures and he wonders if he’ll have family photos like these one day. Will his kid be blonde-haired like him or golden-skinned like her? Will JJ have his arm around a little girl with pigtails or a boy with playtime bruises on his knees? Will they look like John B’s do, filled with laughter and genuine smiles and love with no strings attached?

Will Kie be in them too?

He falls into a restless sleep and dreams of dark-haired babies with blue eyes and mouths that swallow him whole. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH


	7. real weird

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we don't edit chapters! we post our first drafts like MEN!
> 
> (this one's that kind of chapter where the plots gotta happen so we can get to the fun stuff......enjoy anyway hehe)
> 
> music for this chap: 'service road' by better oblivion community center. oh man. a jj song for SURE.

JJ doesn’t sleep well, so waking up in time for a surf the next morning is tough. Especially with the kind of hangover he’s got.

(He’s nineteen. He should know not to mix drinks by now.)

Pope and JJ are out on the water sitting next to each other on their boards waiting for another swell to come through when Pope asks, “You okay, man? You were acting super weird last night.”

JJ squints his eyes and turns his head to face the beach, watching as the little blue-board-short-clad figure that’s John B rubs wax over the top of his board. Pope and JJ had got to Rixon’s first, as it was John B and Sarah’s third anniversary and he’d stayed home to make breakfast for the two of them while the other boys headed out to surf. JJ’s gotta admit it’s kind of cute — even if he does really, truly think John B is beyond whipped.

A splash of water aimed at his head pulls JJ back into the present. He whips around to face Pope again, shaking out his hair. “Huh? Nah, I’m fine,” he says after clearing his throat. “Just stressed with, uh, work.” Kie’s face enters his mind: that dead-eyed gaze she’d given him when she told him she was pregnant, the confusion and disappointment when he’d been able to do little more than ask stupid questions and whisper curses under his breath. 

Yeah, no. He’s not stressed with work. 

Pope raises an eyebrow as if to say,  _ don’t lie to me. _ “Work, huh?” Then, after a beat, “It’s about Kie, isn’t it.”

JJ’s heartbreak quickens. He trails a hand through the water and frowns. “Kie? Like, Kiara Carrera? Our friend Kiara? No. Why would you—“

“Shut up, JJ,” Pope groans, like this is something he has to say all the time. (He does.) “There’s been something going on between you. It’s so obvious.,” he says in his matter-of-fact way, waving his arms around all dramatic like. “Even John B’s mentioned it to me and he’s, like, the most unobservant human alive, so.”

JJ can’t form a coherent sentence, his words coming out in spurts and stutters, mouth open like a gaping fish. It’s not often JJ feels awkward, but when he does? Oh, boy. “It’s not like that—” he starts, but then Pope’s sighing louder than necessary and rolling his eyes, and JJ stops mid-sentence, surrendering himself to the embarrassment. 

He feels terrible. He knows Pope’s had a thing for Kie for years — or, at least, JJ  _ think _ s he’s had a thing for her. Pope definitely caught feelings the summer they found the gold, but the two boys had never talked about what conspired afterwards. Even when it became obvious that Kie and Pope were no longer hanging out alone in secret. Even when Pope stopped showing up to parties at the Boneyard and didn’t reply to the group chat for weeks. Pope’s his best friend, but JJ’s never been good at the emotional shit. They just never really discussed what happened between Pope and Kie, and since JJ lowkey had a crush on her all the way through high school too, he was never interested in learning all the gory details of how often Pope and Kie sucked face and what happened when they stopped.

It’s hard not to like Kiara. (Believe him — JJ’s very much aware.) For all he knows, Pope’s still got the major hots for the girl, and by admitting that he’s been fucking around with her for the better part of the year, JJ might be breaking his heart. And Pope’s heart is very fragile.

“I’m sorry, dude, I didn’t mean to—” JJ rubs a hand over his face, pulling at the skin on his cheek. “You know, with you and Kie—“

“ _ JJ. _ Again, shut  _ up.” _ Pope sounds exasperated now. Full on grumpy-dad-mode. Maybe his heart’s not so fragile after all. “That’s long gone. You know that. Tell me what’s up.”

Well, there’s not really any point in lying about it now, is there? Everyone will find out eventually. Kiara’s pregnant with his fucking  _ baby _ , so— “Kie and me...we...we’ve been…”

“You’ve kissed her, haven’t you?”

He’s done  _ much _ more than fuckin’ kiss her. Pope doesn’t really need to know that. “Uh, yeah…” JJ replies, but Pope’s clearly not letting the wool be pulled over his eyes, and presses on with his investigation. 

“JJ, don’t tell me you’re— you know…” Pope grimaces, sticking out his tongue in disgust once JJ’s silence proves reluctant admittance. 

“It was only a few times,” JJ retorts, throwing up his hands in protest as Pope pretends to gag. “Fine! It was fuckin’— it was more than once, okay?” he hisses through his teeth, watching the shoreline carefully for John B’s movements. For some reason, JJ’s wary of telling his other best friend. He’s not sure why. It just doesn’t feel like the right thing to do. Eventually, yeah. But not now. Thankfully, John B’s still busy waxing his board. JJ turns back to Pope. “Just a handful of times,” he says. “No more than ten.”

Pope’s eyes go wide and his mouth twists into a horrified kind of smile. It makes JJ want to laugh. “JJ!” he exclaims, eyebrows almost to his forehead in surprise.

“I don’t  _ like _ her or anything,” JJ says hurriedly, already knowing as the words spill out of his mouth and out over the rolling ocean that it’s a big fucking lie. “There was just— nothing else to do, after you all left. I was bored. Nothing to it.” He’s not sure why he feels the need to justify the situation, but he attempts to anyway. 

Pope’s having none of it. Still looking at JJ with that astonished expression, he says, “You were bored...ten times?”

Now it’s JJ’s turn to roll his eyes and playfully splash Pope with water. “Shut the fuck up. It wasn’t even ten!”

“What—  _ nine times _ then _?! _ That’s  _ saying _ something, JJ. C’mon.”

“I swear it’s not like that! It’s nothing.”

“Sounds like a huge pile of something to me!”

“I knew I shouldn’t have said anything,” JJ groans. “It’s  _ impossible  _ for you to be chill.”

“Chill? I’m chill!” Pope responds, his voice taking on a shrill quality that makes JJ’s ears hurt. “I’m super chill all the time!”

“You know, repeating that a bunch of times doesn’t make it true.”

“You’re deflecting. Whatever. I’m here for you, bro,” Pope says in the most intentionally condescending tone, paired with a cheeky grin.

“Fuck off, Pope,” JJ curses, but it’s got no bite to it. They lapse into silence while JJ focuses on the feeling of water gently lapping at his bare legs and sloshing over the sides of his board. He loves being out on the open ocean. Any kind of weather, any time of the day, any season of the year. 

Many problems in JJ’s life have been solved by a good surf sesh. He’d often come out here to Rixon’s, or down to the Boneyard, on nights when his dad thought it’d be fun to challenge his son to a boxing match with no gloves. The saltwater always soothed his bruised and split skin just right, the stinging that came along with it a reminder that JJ was still alive, still breathing. There had been many evenings where he’d sat out past the breaking waves, balancing on his back while lying across the board, staring up at the cotton-candy clouds that signified a setting sun, promising whatever created the universe that he would leave his home one day and never look back.

The sea calms him like nothing else does.

JJ starts to feel the pull of water beneath him that signals the coming of another rolling set of waves. He flops back down onto his board with a grunt and paddles himself around so he’s face-on to the horizon, ready for the waves that will surely come soon. Out of the corner of his eye, JJ watches Pope do the same. 

Somewhere behind them, John B is getting into the water. JJ can tell because there’s the sound of splashing and a faraway call of  _ hey, guys, wait for me! _ The moment between Pope and JJ will be gone soon, brushed away with John B’s appearance and the feeling that JJ can’t ever truly be honest with his oldest friend, not really. Again, he’s not sure why. Just knows that Pope’s better to talk to about this kind of shit.

(Maybe it’s because John B went years knowing what was happening at the Maybank house and never talked to JJ about it. Never even  _ mentioned _ the bruises that would appear on his face, arms, sides. He could probably chalk it up to being thirteen and awkward and naive, and he loves John B with all his heart, but still.)

JJ sucks in a deep breath, his stomach already feeling sick. He hates being vulnerable. Hates admitting embarrassing things without making a joke out of it. But someone’s gotta know how he feels, because if he keeps this inside him for much longer, he’ll explode. “I think I like her, alright?” he says, voice barely heard over the crashing of the waves on the beach. “But she doesn’t feel the same way. And there’s— it’s highly complicated.”

“Highly complicated, huh?” Pope replies, and JJ doesn’t have to look at him to know he’s smiling. “Have you actually  _ told _ her you like her?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s weird!” JJ exclaims, twisting around to face Pope again and almost falling off of his board as he does so. “She’ll be weirded out. This thing — it’s always been chill. No dramas. This will  _ create _ drama. Trust me, she doesn’t need any more of it,” he grumbles. And that’s all he’s gonna say about  _ that. _

Thankfully, Pope doesn’t pry. Just keeps his thick eyebrows raised, a sly smirk stuck on his face that looks out of order on Pope who’s usually so empathetic and serious. “I’m pretty sure you’re the one who’s being weird, but whatever,” he concedes. The splashing behind them is getting louder now -- John B’s almost caught up with the other two. “I won’t tell John B, I promise,” Pope whispers, sensing JJ’s hesitation.

“Good,” JJ nods. “We’re never speaking of this again.”

“Oh, we will be,” Pope says airily. “But I’ll let you off the hook right now because I know being vulnerable about your feelings is hard for you.”

“I’m gonna wreck you.”

“You’ll never catch me, buddy. Hey, John B! Long time no see!”

JJ cranes his neck to look behind him at John B, who looks like a shaggy dog with his long, wet hair and big grin.

“Hey!” John B says, still panting from his long paddle, and sits up on his board. “What were you guys talking about?”

Pope flashes JJ a secret smile and says, “Oh, nothing.”

JJ grins. “Just about how Sarah’s got you fucking  _ whipped _ , bro.”

“Hey!” John B frowns. “Don’t talk about my girlfriend like that.”

JJ raises his hands in surrender. “Oh, no, we love Sarah! You’re just a wussy.”

John B rolls his eyes. “I hate you guys.” Pope and JJ grin at each other, and JJ feels the awkwardness of the previous conversation melting away with the seawater. 

“Wave!” John B calls, pointing ahead of them to the curve of a swell coming over the horizon. The three boys scramble to get their chests on their boards, paddling towards the shore to get into a good position. 

“I’m taking this wave,” Pope shouts, readying himself for the crest of the coming wave to pull himself up to standing. 

Pope gets the first ride, but only because JJ let him. Everyone knows JJ’s the best surfer out of all of them and could have easily out-paddled both John B and Pope. JJ just likes the way Pope’s face erupts into an ear-splitting grin when he catches a wave, so he let him have this one. He considers it a favour for not telling anyone else about what he admitted here today: that he might just have a little big crush on one Kiara Carrera.

* * *

A week goes by. JJ attempts to get in contact with Kie a handful of times, but after the third unanswered text he decides to leave her be.

He busies himself with researching everything to do with pregnancy; figuring out how big the baby is right now (little more than a tiny ball of cells, but a baby nonetheless), when they’ll be able to get an ultrasound (somewhere between six and nine weeks), which foods Kie should be avoiding (anything with caffeine, raw fish, alcohol). He still has no idea if she’s planning on keeping the baby or not, but he wants to be prepared. Just in case she comes to him and says  _ hey, JJ, I know we’re like barely legal adults with no money but I want to raise a child with you _ . Which, okay, probably isn’t going to happen, but he can dream, right?

Dream maybe isn’t the right word. He’s as fucking terrified about the prospect of becoming a father as Kie likely is about becoming a mom. This is most definitely not what he wanted out of his lie. He’d actually planned to never have kids -- break the cycle of abuse by ending it with him, and all that. His dad fucked up JJ’s head so much that he’s not sure if he has the capability to be a good parent. But if on the off chance Kie really  _ does _ announce that she’s keeping the kid, he wants the chance to try his absolute best to be the kind of dad he wishes he had.

Kie stays away from the rest of the Pogues for the whole week, too, even though the surf’s pumping and they invite her to multiple barbecue dinners at the Chateau. She cites feeling sick each time a message pops up on the group chat, and everyone just goes along with it. Which maybe isn’t even a lie -- he’s heard that girls can get something called morning sickness a lot in the first trimester of pregnancy. JJ also found out through his late-night Google binges that morning sickness doesn’t even have to be in the morning. Go figure.

It’s at one of these barbecue nights where Kie is absent that Sarah corners JJ in the kitchen. They’re alone -- John B and Pope are out in the hammocks, well out of earshot. Sarah comes in to make a drink, but doesn’t leave after she’s mixed herself another vodka and soda. By the face she’s giving him -- one quirked eyebrow and her trademark pout -- she wants to talk.

“How’re you holding up?” Sarah asks, hip leaning against the counter, sipping her drink while watching JJ make himself a sloppy Joe. He glances up at her in confusion. Is she talking about--? Sarah prefaces her answer to the question with an exaggerated roll of her eyes. “Yes, I know.”

He sighs. “She won’t talk to me, Sarah,” he says, barely whispering, truly not enjoying the experience of having to be stupidly vulnerable twice in one week.

Sarah’s voice is soft and so is her hand when she reaches forward to rests it on his shoulder. “Give her time. She’s going through a lot right now.”

JJ looks up to meet her eyes and crosses his arms over his chest, burger-building forgotten for now. “You think I don’t know that?” he retorts sharply, then winces. “Sorry. I just— I hate being shut out. She’s never like this with me. When you guys aren’t here, we’re—” he reaches up to scratch distractedly at the back of his head, “and then when you come back it’s like she forgets that we—“ his hand falls and slaps idly against the side of his thighs. He sighs, unable to finish the sentence, feeling younger than he is and as stupid as he seems. 

Sarah tips her head to the side and smiles, all understanding and kind of sad. “She’s just confused, that’s all. And she’s becoming a mom. At nineteen. That’s some heavy stuff.” Sarah takes another sip of her drink and grimaces, then scoots around him to grab the bottle of soda and pours some into her glass. She pauses while she tastes her drink. Satisfied, Sarah downs a gulp of the vodka soda then wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. “And I know you must be going through some shit right now too, but, it’s different, you know? She’s got some big decisions to make.”

“About that…” JJ squirms. “Do you know...what she’s thinking? You know. About the...the—”

“I can’t say for sure. I’m sorry,” she says, looking over at him with that sad kind of smile again. “But I know she’s weighing up all the options. She’s researching. She’s getting good advice from the family planning centre. Kie’s a smart girl. She’ll make a good decision, whatever it is. And I know she wants you to be involved in it, too.” Her voice is soothing, calming. It makes JJ feel at ease. Like he really believes what she’s saying about Kie. He  _ wants  _ to believe what she’s saying. “She won’t shut you out forever. Just now, while she processes. Do you get that?”

“I get it,” JJ sighs. “I do. I just—"

“You can say you miss her, JJ, I’m not gonna tease you about it or anything.”

“It’s not li—”

“ _ Not like that _ . Yeah, whatever,” Sarah replies, rolling her eyes again and chuckling. “You sound just like Kie.  _ God. _ Pathetic.” She tips her glass at JJ and downs some of the liquid before continuing. “Anyway. I know it’s not  _ like that _ with you two, or however you wanna bullshit it,” Sarah says, waving the hand that’s not holding her glass around. “But I care about you guys. I love both of you. And I know that, in your own ways, you love each other too. You’ll be okay.”

JJ’s mom’s been gone a long time. He usually pokes fun at Sarah’s need to mom-friend all of the boys (and Kie) twenty-four-seven, but right now? Her concern is comforting. “Thanks, Sarah,” he says, softer than he intended. Sarah just smiles, reaches out again to gently grasp his hand, then leaves the kitchen with drink in hand. 

JJ watches her walk away and greet the boys outside. He considers following right away, but decides he might need a moment to think.

His brain hurts from thinking so much. And that’s not even a  _ joke. _ JJ’s always prided himself on being a go-with-the-flow, happy-go-lucky guy, never getting caught up in any kind of stress or drama. And anything that  _ did _ make him stressed would disappear easily with a few puffs of a vape pen or a blunt or an hour-long surf sesh at Rixon’s. Everything hard or painful is always water off a duck’s back for him. 

It’s why he thought he could handle pulling this friends-with-benefits shit with Kie. He’d done the same kind of thing with plenty of other girls before her and never had an issue.  _ Why should Kie be any different? _ he’d reasoned with himself when Kie had first kissed him that evening at the Chateau. 

But of course she was different. In so many fucking ways. And now he’s stuck with a heart that bleeds red for Kiara Carrera and a potential  _ baby _ on the way and a brain that won’t shut up about anything ever. 

JJ mixes himself a drink with the half-empty vodka and soda bottles Sarah left out on the counter, roughly slams a top sandwich bun onto his burger, and heads out to join the others.

* * *

Three days later on a Monday evening, JJ is sitting in front of the television, gaze locked in on the show he’s watching, when he hears a knock at the door. Thinking it might be John B and Sarah back from their dinner date, he has no qualms about yelling “I’m coming!” and striding over to open the door.

“Kie.” It’s not a greeting, not a welcome, not even a question. He’s in shock. She’s  _ here? _ Now? She came to see him? After all these days of radio silence? He’s stuck standing in place, feeling severely undressed in his thick boot socks and dirty sweatpants, stinking of sweat from work that day. Kie, on the other hand, looks beautiful. As she always does. Half-braided hair tied up into a bun on the top of her head, cheeks and shoulders wet with raindrops from the summer storm raging on outside, multicoloured parka dripping with water.

“JJ.” It’s been a while since he’s heard her say his name. He feels like an idiot for liking it.

“I didn’t know you were coming.”

“Yeah,” she ducks her head and scuffs the toe of her shoe against the wood of the porch. “Sorry about that.”

“It’s raining,” JJ mutters dumbly, not sure what else to say. 

The corners of Kie’s mouth turn up into an amused smile. “I know.” She nods her head in the direction of the lounge. “Can I come in?”

Remembering his manners, JJ snaps back to attention and quickly ushers her in and out of the rain. “You want a drink? I mean— I have water—“  _ Fuck. _ This isn’t going well.

Kie, however, still keeps that private smile on her face, like she’s holding back a laugh. “It’s fine,” she shrugs. “I won’t be here long.”   


“Oh.” JJ hates how his stomach sinks in disappointment. He hates this whole thing -- pretending like nothing’s happened between them, like she didn’t tell him a week and a half ago that she was pregnant, like they’re just old acquaintances from school meeting awkwardly in a shopping mall and making small talk to pass the time. 

Kie kicks off her wet shoes while JJ stands in the weird middle space between the kitchen and the lounge in the little room, hands in his pockets. Then Kie’s standing with him in that liminal space, socked feet matching his, hands in the pockets of her parka. He’s not sure where to look, or what to say, or if he should offer her something to eat or to sit on the couch with him. Why is she here? What does she want to say? He could say so much, but can’t get the words out, can’t do anything but stand there and stare at her. His eyes drift down to her flat stomach, which he instantly feels weird about looking at and averts his eyes. 

After a long pause, Kie begins to talk. “I came here to tell you that I’m keeping it.” JJ’s heart skips a beat -- as cheesy as that sounds, it fucking  _ does. She’s keeping it! _ He’s gonna be a dad! Then she’s opening her mouth again, and all the words come out in a rush, so quick JJ has to strain to hear her. “But you don’t have to be involved if you don’t want to be,” she says, mouth bent into a frown, forehead furrowed. He appreciates that she has the balls to still look him in the face, her gaze unmoving. Fuck, he could get lost in her eyes. He’s as whipped as John B. “You’ve had enough shit happen in your life and I don’t want to be something else to add to that list, so if you want to be let off the hook, that’s fine, I know you wanted to travel and do all that shit so I won’t mind if you go off and do that, and I’m fine on my own, really, I—

And now he has to interrupt, because she looks incredibly anxious and she’s spiralling and he needs to put her out of her misery. Taking a cautious step towards her, he says, “Would you shut the fuck up for one fucking second and listen to what you’re saying to me right now? You’re my best friend, Kie. I’m not going anywhere.”

He swears he sees her bottom lip tremble when she replies, “It’s gonna be weird.” Kie’s voice is so soft, so nervous-sounding. It breaks his heart. How the fuck did they get here?

“It’s gonna be real fuckin’ weird. So what?” JJ reaches up to card a hand through his hair, his fingers catching on Hey, come on. What’s it I always say? Stupid things—“

“Why are you looking at me like I’m supposed to know the end of this sentence?” Kie says sarcastically, except he can tell she’s biting back a smile because he always,  _ always _ knows how to make her laugh. 

He reckons he could coax a proper smile out of her, so he continues, “Oh, c’mon, I’ve said it at  _ least _ once before. Stupid things have good outcomes all the time.”

Kie huffs a short, strangled laugh. “This is a big stupid thing, JJ. There’s no easy fix.” She’s trying to sound serious -- and it  _ is _ serious, he knows that. But that light he loves is also back in her eyes, and the awkward tension in the room is slowly dissipating with each passing second. He starts to feel comfortable again. 

“I never said there had to be an easy fix,” he says, making his way to the living room to sit down on the couch. He waits for her to join him, but she stays standing in the middle of the room, hands still in her pockets. In her big, heavy parka with her denim shorts and legs poking out the bottom, she looks tiny, like it’s swallowing her whole. “I don’t think you’re getting it, Kie,” he continues after waiting a few seconds for her to make a move and being met with nothing. “You’re my best fucking friend. I’m not leaving.” He means  _ every _ fucking word. No doubt in his mind. If this is real -- if they’re really gonna go through with this -- relationship or not, he’ll be there. Every goddamn step of the way. “Are you gonna stay? I was just watching TV.”

And finally she flashes him that smile he’d been missing: wide, open, calming, lovely. He’s always loved her mouth. “What were you watching?” she asks, inching towards the couch. 

He grins. “Parks and Recreation.”

“Finally upgraded from The Simpsons, huh? ‘Bout time.”

“Shut up.” She collapses on the couch next to him, crossing her legs and pulling a blanket across her lap. Then she’s focusing completely on the scene playing out on screen, and JJ’s watching her out of the corner of his eye, trying not to appear too obvious that he’s doing so.

They sit at least a foot apart on the couch, neither wanting to accidentally touch the other, leaving the room clouded with tension -- except now it’s not about neither of them knowing what to say to each other, but more...well, sexual. Romantic. Whatever the fuck. He thinks about all the times he’s had her naked with him on this couch, blushes, briefly wonders if Kie’s thought about that too. JJ wants to touch her, hold her hand,  _ something _ ; he can’t fucking help it. Now that he’s admitted out loud to Pope that he likes the girl he can think of nothing else. He’ll never make the first move, though. Not even with his baby in her belly. Maybe even  _ especially _ not now because of that reason. JJ’s used to being that suave, confident, cheeky boy who can get any girl he wants -- but he’s never felt that way around Kie. 

And so he doesn’t touch her, just sits and watches the show and tries not to focus too hard on keeping his breathing even. He’s still hyper-aware of her body heat beside him, of the soft glow of the blue television light on her amber skin, of the rise and fall of her chest as she breathes.

It gets late. Kie mentions that she has work in the morning and needs to get to sleep. JJ does too. They stand face-to-face in the doorway, one foot inside, one out. JJ rests his back against the doorframe and tucks his hands in his sweatpant pockets.

“So—” he says at the same time as Kie says, “I was thinking—”

They both laugh, a soft sound that rings throughout the kitchen, then JJ motions for Kie to speak. “I was thinking...I was gonna book a scan sometime soon. Do you wanna come with me?” She pulls her bottom lip under her teeth and struggles to look him right in the eye.

JJ ducks his head and grins. “Of course, Kie. I hear it’s six weeks, right?” He glances up to look at her again after she’s quiet for a moment and loves the way her mouth forms a little ‘o’, dark brows furrowed.

“How’d you know?” She sounds pleasantly surprised that he’s been doing his research, and he likes that it makes him feel attentive and smart. Like he’s showing her he can be good at this. He  _ will _ be good at this.

He shrugs. “I gotta know these things now, right? It’s important. Like— you’re four or five weeks, right? Did you know baby’s as big as a peppercorn right now? Crazy, huh—” he goes to say, but Kie’s cutting him off by stepping forward and wrapping her arms around him.

After a breath where his hands stay at his sides in shock, he pulls her close until they’re chest to chest. One of his arms is across the back of her shoulders, one around her waist, both her hands pressed against his back, her chin tucked into the crook of his neck. 

“Thank you,” she whispers into the collar of his shirt.

“For what?” His chest feels tight. She smells so good — like saltwater and jasmine.

“For being here,” she says, breath hot against his neck. “For always being here.”

Something raw catches in his throat. His fingers flex across her back, unsure of what to do, unable to pull her closer than she already is. Then Kie is stepping away and his arms are falling limp and useless and heavy, and her eyes are shining with unshed tears.

She looks like a princess. A beautiful, tawny-skinned, curly-haired dream girl with a peppercorn baby inside her belly. And she’s looking at him like he’s a good person, like he’s wanted, like he’s significant. It makes his whole body ache.

“Have a good day at work,” is all he says when he opens his mouth to speak. He feels silly. Kie, in all her gracious goodness, just smiles. 

“You too, J.” Then she’s turning away and heading out to her car without another look back. 

He stays standing in the doorway, one foot in, one out, watching the road long after she’s gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ugh this was messy but OH WHALE. now we get to the good stuff huh :')))))))))))) i love them


	8. old scars

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> JJ Angst™ to the EXTREME here. i hope ya'll enjoy. tw for mentions of jj's abuse.
> 
> jiara jams for this chap: 'rubble to rubble' by wilderado (a MUST listen while reading, honestly); 'georgia' by phoebe bridgers (an anon on tumblr said they listen to this song while reading this fic every time and that is the cutest thing i've ever heard, so this is 4 u anon); 'gun song' by the lumineers (after another anon told me they think this is a peak jj jam, to which i agree)' 'can i call you tonight?' by dayglow
> 
> yes i KNOW that's a lot of songs but u MUST listen trust me. i might make a spinning in circles playlist sometime soon lel ANYWAY happy saturday (or friday, idk where ya'll are in the world rn) xoxo

Everything is relatively normal for JJ after those first few crazy weeks. He spends most of his time working at the shop and silently coming to terms with the fact that he’s gonna be a father, seeing the Pogues on some evenings and surfing with them on the weekends. 

Kiara starts to hang around the Chateau more often, being the earliest to arrive at hang outs and the last to leave late at night. JJ thinks she might be making a more conscious effort to be cool with him, and he appreciates it. He secretly treasures the coy smiles she throws in his direction when helping Pope chop lettuce for a salad, the nonchalant touches of his forearm, his shoulder, his back when she passes by him in the hallway, the gentle press of her knee to his when they’re lying side-by-side in the hammocks. 

Pope keeps raising his eyebrows at him whenever JJ looks at Kie for too long. JJ always just flips him off.

Keeping the secret of Kie’s pregnancy is super fucking hard, especially on those nights when JJ’s wasted with the boys out on the HMS Pogue, because when he’s drunk he tends to say shit he shouldn’t, and it takes many conscious efforts to literally bite his tongue to stop from speaking. 

He wonders when she’ll be ready to tell everyone. He hopes it's soon, because Pope, John B and Sarah are all going back to college in just a few weeks, and he wants to be able to surprise them before they go.

Because that’s how he’s looking at this whole baby thing now: a welcome surprise. He’s gotten past the instant shock and now is drifting into happy territory. He’s having a baby! A little gremlin kid is gonna pop out of Kie at some point in the next seven or eight months and have half of his genes! He’s gonna be a dad!

He thinks the fear of being a dad this young hasn’t set in quite yet, and he’s prepared for that feeling (he thinks) but hopes it’s entrance into his life is prolonged further. JJ likes being able to look at Kie and know, with a joyful warmth in his chest, that she’s gonna be the mother of his child. 

JJ would like to hang out with Kie one-on-one, just like they used to. (Without the sex part, of course, although if she ever wanted to get back to that, he wouldn’t say _no._ ) He’s just not sure when the right time is to ask. While a lot of the tension between them disappeared after that night she turned up at his house and told him she was keeping the baby, there’s still some remnants of awkwardness between them that he’d like to get rid of. He misses being with Kie, watching shitty television and eating bags on bags of Takis (they’re the only ones out of the five who actually like them), all tangled up on the couch under one of the blankets Sarah had knitted last winter. He misses the feeling he gets when he’s with her -- like he can be purely _JJ._ No bullshit. No additives or artificial colours. Pure, unadulterated JJ in all his inappropriate-joke-telling forms. 

But, despite his best efforts to make it not so, it’s still kind of awkward between them. They’ve seen each other naked more times than he can count. She’s pregnant with his baby. They’re best friends, but they’re not together. It’s messed up and confusing on so many levels, so the awkwardness is understandable. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t suck.

Then JJ has a fucking panic attack, and all worries about awkwardness go out the fucking window.

On one Tuesday afternoon, JJ’s dad shows up at the auto shop to pick up a motor. 

JJ’s working on a car inside the garage when he hears that familiar low, grumbling, perpetually-pissed voice coming from out in the carpark. JJ slides out on his creeper from under the Mercedes’ undercarriage (such fuckin’ Kook shit, spending _that_ much money on a stupid car) and gets a sideways view of his dad, standing with his arms crossed in front of his chest, talking to JJ’s boss at the front door of the garage office.

He watches as Luke shakes hands with the mechanic, picks up the old boat motor, and trudges his boot-clad feet through the garage, making his way out to the carpark. He pauses in his steps just as he’s about to leave the garage, clearly noticing JJ’s head of dirty blond hair poking out from under the car. JJ looks up and comes face to face with the grizzled, mean face of his father.

It’s the first time JJ’s seen his dad since before he found out Kie was pregnant. The Outer Banks is a small town, and JJ’s been doing everything he can to avoid any possible run-ins with his father. That means Fisherman’s Grill down at the wharf hasn’t seen any patronage from JJ since the day he moved out of his father’s house. Neither has the corner store on Greenfield and West, or the bowling alley in South Village where the slot machines there entertain Luke Maybank’s dollars every Friday night. 

And now he’s seeing his dad, in the one place he thought Luke’d never come (there are at least five other auto shops in the Outer Banks _alone_ , so why’d he ever have to come here?), and he’s still stuck on his creeper, half-under the belly of the Mercedes, grease on his face and dirty bandana in his hair, staring up at the man who made him and shivering in his looming shadow.

He feels very, very young, very, very stupid, and -- stranger than all -- very, very afraid.

Luke makes eye contact with his son. For a moment it looks like he’s going to say something. JJ’s mouth opens ready to reply to whatever he has to say, but no words come out. What is he supposed to say? He hasn’t talked to his dad in months. They have nothing in common. And he’s sure as hell not gonna tell him about the baby -- he’s _especially_ not gonna blurt that little piece of information out to the whole auto shop. 

In the end, JJ doesn’t even have to worry about coughing up a greeting. Luke Maybank just glares down at his son with a curled lip and a rough glint in his eye (that isn’t exactly mean but definitely isn’t friendly), blinks once, then turns away. 

JJ holds his breath until he’s sure his dad’s truck has well and truly left the car park. When he does exhale, it all comes out in a shaky _whoosh,_ and that fear he’d hoped would stay away for as long as possible floods into his body as bile rising in his throat.

He swallows thickly and rolls himself back under the car, putting his hands to work to stop them from shaking. It works for a little while, but then he starts sweating (more than usual for the kind of work he’s doing) and oxygen begins to enter his lungs in shorter and faster breaths until his head is dizzy and his chest feels tight.

The attempt to concentrate on something else, anything else, other than that sticky fear in his gut and his throat has failed miserably. Wild thoughts and terrible memories spin circles in his mind: hearing his parents fight for the last time in the middle of the night when he was seven; the sound of his mom’s car driving away while Luke screamed at her to come back; the first time JJ had tasted blood on his tongue, sweet and metallic, after being slapped in the face; being fifteen and hitting back, feeling his knuckles crack under the pressure of bone hitting bone; Luke’s face twisted into a snarl, spitting at him, saying _if you’re gonna leave, you better not think about ever coming back!_ ; the sinking in his chest when Kie had told him she was pregnant and he’d thought _oh fuck, I don’t know how to be a father._

It all culminates in a feeling so terrifying, so suffocating, that JJ realises he’s so wound up, he can barely breathe.

Wiping sweat from his brow, he checks the time on his watch. 3:45pm. Only fifteen minutes left on his shift. He can push through. He’s a tough kid.

And he is. The fifteen minutes goes by agonizingly slow, and then he’s out the door and onto his bike the second the clock strikes four. Tears blur his vision as he rides home. He’s pretty sure it’s just the wind.

The first thing JJ does when he gets home is roll himself a joint. Usually, even the process of forming it takes some stress away, and after the first drag, everything feels much better. But today, he still can’t breathe properly, and his hands shake, and it takes him three tries to get it rolled right. In the end, he can’t even bring himself to take a puff because he starts thinking about how he’ll probably have to kick the smoking habit if he’s planning to hang around a pregnant Kie (and then a baby), and then he’s looking at the joint like it’s a weapon of mass destruction rather than a bit of paper and some weed. He throws it in the bin, which is totally unlike him, but it just feels like the right thing to do.

John B and Sarah are out again, visiting some of Sarah’s friends from school out on Figure Eight. They always seem to be out these days. It’s not that JJ doesn’t mind the peace and quiet; he just wishes they’d stick around more, because they’re leaving soon and the time he has with his friends never feels like enough.

He sits out on the porch stoop, watches the afternoon sun sparkle on the water, and tries to regulate his breathing. It doesn’t work. That fear is still there, and now it’s rising and rising and blood is rushing to his ears as he puts his head in his hands and urges his brain, still throwing taunting images of his dad’s face at him, to _shut the fuck up!_

He finally admits to himself that he’s fucking _terrified_ of becoming a father. 

His own childhood was so fucked up on so many levels, and although JJ’s no psychologist, he knows for sure that there are some things about him that have been deeply affected by the way he was brought up. By his mom leaving and never saying goodbye, never calling on birthdays, never letting him know if she was dead or alive. By his dad deciding that the only way his son could ever learn any kind of discipline was to beat him into submission. It’s all trauma, or whatever shit they call it, and he knows it’s fucked him up beyond belief.

Like in the way that he struggles to trust authority figures, like cops (fuck everyone but Sheriff Peterkin, honestly) and teachers. Or how he never allows himself to be vulnerable, because telling someone his feelings means exposing his jugular vein and waiting for someone to slice it through. Becoming involved with Kie had been the first real vein-exposing thing he’s ever done, because even though he’d tried to convince himself that it was nothing, it was always going to be _something._ And now that’s resulted in a _baby_. And fatherhood is probably the most soul-baring, vulnerable fucking thing that could ever happen to a man.

JJ is determined to make sure their kid ends up with two parents who love it -- no matter if those said parents are together (which he and Kie aren’t) or love each other (which they do, but not in the way that really counts). And he knows he’ll love this kid. He’s just scared that he won’t be able to show that love in a way his kid will understand because of the nineteen years of fucked-up “love” he’s received by both his mom and his dad.

Tears prick at his eyes. His heart rate is so high he swears he can feel the pulse of blood pumping through his veins. _Ba dum, ba dum, ba dum ba dum ba dum._ He can’t breathe. He can’t fucking _breathe_. And there’s no one home to tell him it’s gonna be okay.

So he does the only thing that makes sense at the time, even though they haven’t had a substantial conversation in weeks, even though it’s been still slightly awkward between them.

He calls Kie.

She picks up on the second ring. “J?”

He has to stop himself from sighing with relief when he hears her voice. He’s surprised at how much it calms him instantly. Just like the sea. “Hey, Kiara. Are you—” he pauses to breathe deep and rub a hand over his face, “are you home?”

“Hey, I’m not, I’m sorry,” she replies, and really sounds apologetic. Almost mournful, like she wishes she was with him. Maybe that’s just his wishful thinking. “I’m at my uncle’s house in Wilmington. We’ve got a family reunion thing, it’s— anyway— how are you? Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I— No, I—” he sighs, slows himself down, continues with, “I saw my dad today.”

Kie’s breath hitches. “J—“

“It was fine,” he interrupts before he has to hear any of her pity. That’s not what he needs. He’s not _exactly_ sure what it is he needs from her right now, but it’s definitely not pity. “Nothing happened. He just came into work to get a motor. I thought it would be fine, but I— I keep having flashbacks to what it was like when I was a kid, before Mom left, and how—” JJ squeezes his eyes shut and leans back to lie down on the porch floor. It doesn’t matter that the wood is damp and half-rotted out. “And it wasn’t that he never told me he loved me, you know?” he continues, voice as small as he feels. “He always said he loved me enough to make sure I could be better. But it never felt like he was trying to make me a better kid, Kie, it just felt—“

“He doesn’t know what love means, JJ,” Kie interjects sharply, fiercely, like she’s trying to protect him from a danger that she was never able to before. “That’s not love. You know that.” Then, softer, “Do you need me to come home?”

“No, no, it’s fine, sorry. It’s just— I’m nineteen, Kie.” His voice cracks on her name and he hates himself for it. “I don’t have a caseworker anymore. I don’t have anyone to protect me from him. No one but myself. I don’t want him to have anything to do with our kid. Nothing.” And now he’s getting angry, feeling that rage build up inside his chest, a burning blue fire, overpowering the fear that had existed there before. “I want him out of our fucking lives, he doesn’t deserve to be a part of mine, he— he—” And then he’s stumbling over his words and feeling like crying, because it’s all too fucking much, and he doesn’t know why he’s telling her all this. Only that it feels right to. “I just don’t want to be a shitty dad,” he concludes after a long pause. 

“Listen up, JJ,” Kie replies, that roaring heat back in her voice. “You’re _nothing_ like him. You’ll never be anything like him. It’s fucking impossible for you to become a shitty father. You know why? Because you’re the best friend I’ve got, J.” He swears he hears a sob catch in her throat then, which is strange, because why would Kie be crying over him? “You’re the greatest friend any of us have got. You’ve gotten beat the fuck up for us, gone to jail for us, taken the fall for us over and over again.” She sucks in a shuddering breath. When she speaks again, her voice is all high and shaky. If JJ wasn’t sure she was crying before, he’s sure of it now. It melts something in his heart. “And you’re doing so good at taking care of me. You are. You’re gonna be a great dad.”

“Kie—“ he goes to say, his voice hoarse with emotion.

“Don’t say my name like that. You know I mean every single fucking word I’m saying. This kid’s fucking lucky to have you.”

Her voice is still raw, and he’s struck with the desperate urge to reach through the phone and brush her tears away like he’s some fucking hero in a romantic movie. The feeling of care for Kiara overwhelms him. “Fuck,” he breathes, and thinks again, _this could never be nothing. It was always gonna be something._

There’s a long silence. JJ opens his eyes to stare up at the roof of the porch. He spots a couple spiders making a web. Thinks he should probably relocate them out to the garden because Sarah’s scared of spiders, especially big, hairy ones like these. He listens to Kie’s slowly-steadying breath down the line and wonders when Sarah and John B are getting home, and if Pope is enjoying his day of fishing on his dad’s boat, and if Kie thinks him stupid for calling her or not. His reverie is broken by her voice asking, “You sure you don’t need me to come home?”

JJ smiles. “No, I’m okay. Thank you.” He pushes himself back up into a seated position and rests his elbows on his overall-clad knees. “What are you doing right now?” he asks, desperate for an excuse to change the subject and take the heat off of himself, not wanting to hang up the phone and stop talking to her.

“I’m outside on the porch talking to you,” she says, and it sounds like she’s smiling back. “My family is inside playing Monopoly Deal. It sounds like it’s getting pretty heated. I don’t think they miss me.”

“Do they know?” He doesn’t specify whether he’s talking about her being on the phone with him or Kie being pregnant, but she seems to know instinctively what he means.

“No,” she says quietly. “I don’t know when I’ll tell them. Are you gonna…are you ever gonna tell your da—“

“No,” he replies, short and decisive and sharp. “No, I— He’s not in my life anymore. He doesn’t deserve to know. He doesn’t get to be part of this. He’s had nineteen fucking years to shape up and be the kind of guy that deserves to be a grandfather, but no. Fuck him.” Ah, shit, now he’s getting all riled up again, and his throat is getting all itchy, and those angry tears are welling up in his eyes. JJ bites his lip. “I don’t want him. I don’t want him. I never wanted him.” But he did. Still does. It’s fucking messed up and heartbreaking and terrible, but he does.

“I can come home, J. It’s alright. I can be there in an hour twenty, tops.” Kie’s voice is as smooth as honey, soothing, calming. He almost says _yes, please come home, I need you_ , then realises how selfish that seems.

JJ shakes his head ‘no’ even though she can’t see him. “I’m sorry. It’s okay. You’re fine. I just— I guess I’m still— I’m thinking a lot about becoming a dad, and how the...the, uh, the way my dad was — _is_ — with me…how that might affect how I am...” he trails off, struggling to get the words out, to pull aside his metaphorical collar and expose his neck to her once again. He grits his teeth and pushes through the uncomfortableness of the moment. (He’s a tough kid, after all.) “I honestly never thought I’d have kids, Kie,” he admits, feeling very, very vulnerable and very, very small. “For real. I read this thing once about how the only truly effective way to break the cycle of, uh, abuse, is to never give yourself the chance to inflict that abuse on others. Or something.”

Kie is silent for a long time. He tears some skin off the inside of his bottom lip by worrying it between his teeth too hard, waiting for her to answer. When she eventually does, she sounds like she’s been crying again. “JJ...that’s— you realise how depressing that is, right? Depriving yourself of a family? That’s even more fucked up than what you’ve gone through already. You’re allowed to have this, JJ.”

“Kie…”

“I mean it. Didn’t you hear me before? I mean every fucking word I say when it comes to you. I know you’re scared. Shit, I am too. But if you’re scared about becoming a dad because of the way you were brought up...we can get support, okay? My mom knows a really good family therapist. We can go together. You can even just talk on the phone if that’s more comfortable for you. Or we don’t have to go at all — it’s up to you. Just know that help’s there if you need it.” Fuck, he really wishes she was here right now. But he’s so glad they’re talking like this. He’s embarrassed to admit that he’s not sure he’d have the guts to say all this if she were here in person. And this conversation is important. Suddenly, nothing feels awkward between them anymore. Not after he bared his neck to her, waited, and saw that she refused to cut him open. He’s safe with Kie. “And I’ll be here,” she continues. “I’m not leaving. Remember what you said when I told you I was keeping the baby? The other week?”

“Kie—” He’s said her name so many times, you’d think it was the only word he knows.

“You said I was your best friend and you weren’t fuckin’ leaving. Now I get to say that to you. You’re my best friend, JJ Maybank, and _I ain’t fuckin’ leaving_. Do you hear me?” she says, demanding, and he’s not gonna lie -- it’s kind of hot. That she’s determined to be so fiercely loyal to him, no matter what. No matter that they don’t love each other like that. No matter that they’re not together.

(He thinks that fearless, protective spirit she’s exhibiting with him right now is a good trait to have for a future mama. The thought brings him comfort. He might be fucked up, but Kie’s got her head screwed on tight. This kid’s gonna be okay.)

“Thanks, Kiara,” he sighs. He notices that his breathing has returned to normal, and that icky taste of bile at the base of his tongue has disappeared. Kie’s always known how to calm him down. 

“I’ll be back on Sunday. Take care of yourself, okay?”

“I will,” he smiles. “See you.”

JJ hangs up the phone, places it in his pocket, and goes to find a broom to get rid of those spiders.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was meant to be longer but i thought it was better to leave this here. i hope i did jj and his complicated past with his parents (namely his dad for obvious reasons) justice here <3
> 
> thank you sm for all your lovely comments! they honestly keep me wanting to write. i appreciate ya'll so much 
> 
> also i'm not from america so i've never eaten takis but i've heard they literally rot your gut and it seems fitting that only jj (and kie) would like them lol


	9. only two of us were lying! maybe three!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you wanted fluff ????? you GOT it bruv
> 
> thank you sm to my lovely beta shannon for reading this over for me <3
> 
> songs of the chapter are ‘late bloomer’ by mereba and ‘ur name on a grain of rice’ by runnner
> 
> (i’m sorry this is soooo late — been a hectic few weeks for me. BUt i’m on holiday for the next 2 and a half so hopefully i’ll be getting loaaads of writing done between now and then and chapters can be pumped out quicker than they are now !!)

On the Monday evening after Kie comes home from Wilmington, she calls JJ to ask if he wants to come with her to her first sonogram.

“Are— are you sure you want me there?” he sputters down the line as he drives home from work, phone cradled against his ear and shoulder because he hates talking over speakerphone (even if it’s technically illegal). 

Kie sighs. “JJ. You’re the dad. Of course I want you there. I thought we promised we wouldn’t be awkward anymore.”

And it’s true — they _did_ promise. After that slightly embarrassing but much-needed phone call the week earlier, Kie and JJ had been in constant contact while she’d been away. It had started with a few follow-up texts from Kie making sure JJ was okay, then it had morphed into meme-sharing on Instagram and sending each other the dumbest photos possible on Snapchat. Things were feeling normal again, and JJ had (accidentally) said as much during one of their daily FaceTimes. 

Usually, these calls consisted of JJ telling wildly-exaggerated stories of the waves he and John B had caught that afternoon, and Kie complaining that she was sick of her family and couldn’t wait to get home to the Banks so she could _“annoy you and Pope again”_ (in her own words.) Then, once when it was late on the Saturday before she was due to come home, in a lull in the conversation, JJ let it slip:

_“I like this.”_

_“What?”_

_“Oh. You know. Us— talking again. It’s nice.”_

_“I’ve only been gone a week,”_ she’d said, but he’d heard the teasing smile in her voice.

_“I know. I meant, like— it’s been kinda weird lately— or at least I think it’s been weird— I—“_

_“Well, let’s promise we won’t be awkward anymore. We’ve got a long road ahead of us. I want to do it together. As...as friends.”_ She had stuttered on that last bit. JJ had willed every single cell in his body to take it at face value and not read into it too much.

_“Yeah. As friends.”_

“Are you still there?” Kie’s real-life voice tugs him back into the present.

JJ clears his throat. “Yeah, yeah. Sorry. I’m just driving. When’s the sonogram?”

“Wednesday afternoon,” she replies. “I’ve booked it already. Three o’clock. Can you make it?”

“I don’t finish work until five on Wednesday, but I can get it off.”

“Oh, shit, I should have checked with you first, I’m sorry, I can cancel it and we can go another day—” she’s rambling, and normally it’s pretty cute, but JJ knows how stressful this must be for her so goes to put her quickly at ease.

“Kie, it’s fine,” he smiles, wider once he hears her heave a sigh of relief. “My boss likes me, he’ll let me have the afternoon off. I’ll just make up some shit about having to go to the doctor’s or something. I’ll tell him I have chronic diarrhea so he won’t ask any follow-up questions.”

She laughs at that, and he loves the sound. Would like to make her laugh every day of her life, if he could. “Okay. Wednesday, then.”

“Wednesday it is,” JJ echoes, like they’re organising a time for a barbecue night at the Chateau instead of booking in to see their baby move on some black-and-white screen in what’s arguably going to be one of the most important moments of his life. 

He hangs up and drives home to John B and Sarah with the biggest grin on his face (because— baby! Kie! Baby and Kie!), and has to come up with another lie about getting a good tip at work to explain why it looks like the corners of his lips might split from smiling. 

* * *

On Wednesday at three, JJ picks Kie up two blocks away from her parents’ house so her dad doesn’t start asking questions. He pulls up on the side of the road at the bus stop where she’s waiting and quickly exits the truck, going to hold the passenger door open for her. She gives him a look, like _I’m not an invalid, just pregnant_ , but accepts his help anyway. (He has a feeling that this kind of exchange might become a regular thing for the two of them in the months to come, because you can bet your ass he’s gonna do everything he can to make life comfortable for her, and that she’s gonna fight him on it at every turn.)

They don’t speak for a while as they ride, just listening to the radio’s daily round up of the Top Ten Hits. Today, the number three spot goes to that fucking song about dancing monkeys or some shit, which JJ thinks is the most annoying thing in the world, so he shuts off the radio as soon as it starts playing. 

Then they’re sat in silence as JJ drives them out of the township and across the bridge to the highway out to the mainland, and JJ starts to freak out a little that Kie’s gonna go back on her promise of not being weird. But then she’s reaching over to grab his free hand that rests idly on top of his jeans (his regular boardies felt too casual for such a day, even though Kie’s literally wearing her beat-up Birkenstocks) while staring straight ahead, and JJ’s heart skips a fucking beat. 

JJ’s been thinking about this ultrasound all fucking week. He’s been Googling pictures of ten-week baby scans every night for the past couple days, trying to understand how to decipher the grainy pictures he finds and figure out which is a hand, which is a leg, which is the nose. And then he looks at those pictures of strangers’ babies and thinks about the baby that’s growing inside Kie, and how it’s gonna be half her and half him, and how he thinks he might like Kie more than he let on to Pope all those weeks ago.

She’s humming an unfamiliar song and staring out the window when he glances at her, dark hair brushed up into a bun on the top of her head, baby hairs tucked away under one of her favourite headbands (the faded green one), skin glowing golden in the afternoon light: beautiful, as she always is. He knows from conversations with her in the past week that her morning sickness has reached its peak and that she’s been vomiting almost every day when she wakes up — but with the way she looks right now, all calm and happy and humming to a song only she can hear, you’d never know it. 

Then, while he’s admiring her and trying to keep his eyes on the road at the same time, her thumb brushes absently over his knuckles, and JJ thinks _he_ might be the one to actually throw up.

Yeah. He’s fucked. Well and truly.

She squeezes his hand, once, twice, then starts tapping out an erratic rhythm on the back of his hand. From the corner of his eye he can see her biting down on her bottom lip. All telltale signs of Kie being anxious. Sucking in a shallow breath, JJ tightens his hold on Kie’s hand, stares straight at the traffic ahead, and asks, “Are you scared?”

She answers with a decisive, “Yeah.”

He’s slightly taken aback by her admittance. “Oh.”

“Oh, what?”

“I dunno,” he shrugs with a smile. “I thought you’d say, _nah, JJ, I’m fine, don’t be a pussy_ , because you always like to act like you’re tougher than me or something.”

Kie laughs, sharp and short. “Or something. _Huh_. Whatever, loser.” She’s making fun of him but he doesn’t care because she’s still holding his hand in what has become a record for the longest non-sexual touching they’ve ever had. Which, okay, is a weird thing for him to notice, but who cares? “No, I’m definitely scared,” she continues, serious now. “I was talking to Sarah last night and said that it was okay to be scared, because this is a huge deal, and so I’m admitting it. Plus, I thought we were trying to be honest with each other from now on.”

“We are. Wait— you’ve been talking to Sarah?”

“Duh.” He’s not looking at her, but he’s pretty sure she’s rolling her eyes. Yeah, of _course_ she’d be talking to Sarah. She’s Kie’s best friend. (Best _girl_ friend, because JJ would like to think he’s Kie’s best friend, too.)

“Oh. When do you think we’ll get to tell the others?”

“About the baby?”

“No, about how I finally bought a house in Yucatan— _yes_ , the baby.”

“Geez, calm down,” she teases, and JJ smiles at the back-and-forth. “Um, maybe soon. Today? I mean, we’re seeing all of them tonight at the Chateau. You’re coming to that, right?”

It’s his turn to roll his eyes. “I live there, Kie.”

“Right. Yeah. Anyway— we could tell them then? If the scan comes back good today there’s no reason why we can’t announce it.”

 _Oh. Right. Yeah._ That’s the whole idea of getting a sonogram, right? To check that the baby’s growing as it should be. JJ doesn’t want to think about what would happen if it wasn’t. He swallows down the lump that’s appeared in his throat as he asks, “And what about our— _your_ parents?” _Her_ parents, because he’s definitely not talking to his dad about this.

Kie seems to have the same apprehension about telling her own parents. “No,” she says quickly. “Not yet. Let’s just keep it to us for now. I’ll deal with them later.”

JJ doesn’t bother asking when _later_ will be, because parents are a sensitive subject for both of them, he knows. Instead, he focuses on the road in front of him and the soft weight of her palm against his until they pull into the parking lot of the doctor’s office. 

“You ready?” he asks as he watches her exit the passenger’s side from his spot fiddling with his keys on the curb (she had refused to let him help her this time). 

“Yep!” she chirps with an almost-certainly-fake smile plastered on her face and slams the car door. If he didn’t know her so well, he’d take that at face value, but JJ’s not stupid. He sees how her hand shakes, ever so slightly, as she reaches up to adjust her headband. It’s why he extends a hand for her to hold as they begin to walk into the reception, and he doesn’t feel completely weird for doing it, because she’d held his hand first today, right?

To the relief of his lungs that had been holding his breath, Kie accepts his hand with a small smile. 

JJ tries not to spontaneously combust.

The lady at the reception desk smiles widely at them as the double doors slide open. “Hello! Are you our three o’clock?”

JJ expects Kie to answer because she’s the one who booked the damn thing. But then she’s saying nothing at all, mouth hanging wide like she’s mid-conversation and forgot what she was doing, red colouring her cheeks. Realising that she’s probably feeling the same way he is — nervous as everloving _fuck_ — JJ squeezes her hand reassuringly and steps in to say, “That’s us!”

The lady asks them to take a seat until the sonographer asks for them. It feels like an hour before Kie and JJ are called down to follow a short, bespectacled woman down a hallway and into a small, bright room — but it’s likely no more than five minutes. Kie’s hand briefly slips from his when she’s ushered to the bed in the middle of the room, and his skin stings at the loss of contact, but as soon as the sonographer starts talking about what they might expect to see on the scan, her hand finds its way into his again.

“How long have you two been together?” the sonographer asks innocently, clearly noticing Kie and JJ’s joined hands. 

From his seat in the uncomfortable hospital chair next to the bed, JJ blushes and goes to retract his hand. “Oh, we’re no—“

Kie’s grip on him is tight. “Since we were fourteen,” she interjects sweetly. 

“Oh, wow!” the sonographer smiles. “Congratulations.”

“Thank you.”

It’s not until the sonographer pops out of the room for a moment that JJ turns to Kie and asks, “What was all _that_ about?”

Kie rolls her eyes but doesn’t let go of his hand, even though his palm is probably super sweaty by now. “Do you feel like explaining how we got ourselves in this situation? No. I didn’t think so.”

JJ sighs. “You’re so much smarter than me.”

“Don’t I know it,” she smirks, and he thinks there’s something so hot about that cocky confidence, even if he knows she’s really wearing it like a mask. The sonographer comes back into the room and asks them if they’re ready to go, and Kie nods and smiles and squeezes his hand so tight he thinks his bones might crack.

Then Kie is pulling up her shirt to expose her tummy and as the lady rubs blue goo all over Kie’s stomach, JJ can’t help but stare.

He hasn’t seen Kie’s belly yet, and he’s not sure what he was expecting, but the sight of the slightest hint of a bump in the lower part of her abdomen makes his heart skip a beat. He watches as the sonographer gently moves the transducer (yeah, he _does_ know what the fuck that is, because Google is his best friend) over her belly. 

At first there’s a whole lot of nothing: just a pixelated black and white picture of what he knows _logically_ is Kie’s uterus but looks much more like the inside of a black hole. 

But then. But _then._

A grainy little smudge. With arms. And legs. And a tiny, bean-shaped head.

“And here it is,” says the sonographer with a smile. “The heartbeat is strong. All the limbs seem to be in the right place. Baby’s looking good.”

“Oh my fucking God.” JJ can’t help himself. It just falls out as he stares and tries to remember what it feels like to breathe. 

_“JJ!”_ Kie admonishes, a hiccup of a laugh in her voice. He blushes scarlet.

“Sorry!” he apologises, mouth still agape. “It’s just so— so—“ He waves a hand in the general direction of the monitor and struggles to explain how he’s feeling. _It’s so real_ , he wants to say, but his tongue can’t form comprehensible words. He really can’t believe that little shadow on the screen is a baby — _his_ baby. It’s all so real now. And not that it wasn’t before, but— it’s different. Kie being pregnant isn’t just a concept to him anymore. It’s real. That’s their baby right there. A four centimetre-long, half-formed smudge of a human, but a human just the same. 

“It’s okay,” the sonographer says with a knowing smile. “This is a big moment. It’s normal to be a little speechless. Do you want to hear what baby’s heartbeat sounds like?”

JJ nods an enthusiastic yes. The sonographer taps some keys and soon the familiar yet utterly new sound of a human heart beating _da dum, da dum, da dum_ fills the room. JJ sits listening, jaw slack, spellbound. 

“Oh my fucking _God_ ,” Kie whispers.

“Language, Kie,” JJ jibes (it's a miracle he’s able to joke around when his whole body is fucking _shaking_ like it is), and Kie pinches the soft skin between his thumb and forefinger in retaliation. 

The sonographer is going on about meeting with a midwife and coming into the clinic again for another scan at twenty weeks, and Kie is nodding her head and replying and asking questions, but JJ can’t really hear anything they’re saying.

He can do nothing but stare.

 _I’m gonna love you so fuckin’ hard, little smudge_ , he thinks fiercely as he watches the baby’s legs move ever so slightly. _You don’t even know what’s coming._

* * *

They’re walking back to JJ’s truck after the appointment when his world flips upside down for the second time that day. 

“That was cool, right?” JJ says as they come to the parking spot, a wide grin stuck to his face. He runs a hand through his hair and huffs a laugh of disbelief as he gets his keys out to unlock the truck. “So crazy to hear the baby’s heartbeat and—“

He’s cut off by Kie grabbing ahold of his right bicep, spinning him around to face her, then pressing a tight-lipped salty kiss to his mouth. 

She steps away after three— no, _four_ — seconds, and when he opens his eyes again he notices that hers are wet with unshed tears. _Ah. Salt._

“Thank you,” Kie says with a watery smile. She squints into the afternoon sun as she looks up at him, the light painting her cheeks with flecks of gold.

He opens and closes his mouth like a stunned fish. “For what?” he rasps. 

“Coming with me,” Kie says, tilting her head to the side and studying his face. “Being here.”

JJ feels embarrassed all of a sudden. Her words remind him of that time she’d come over and hugged him as they stood in the doorway and whispered _thank you for always being here._ He likes that she thinks he’s trustworthy, and loyal, and steadfast. He hopes she knows he’d do anything for Kie and the baby in her belly. “Oh,” he blushes, and desperately thinks of a way to come up with a joke to lighten the heavy air that’s settled between them but comes up short. 

Then Kie’s skirting around him and jumping into the passenger’s seat and he’s following her into the truck while thinking, _did that really just happen?_

He smiles as he drives and Kie rolls the windows down and undoes her bun so her dark curls flow free in the wind. His lips still taste of salt, and he wishes she’d kiss him again. 

JJ decides then and there, while listening to Kie ramble on (and he knows it’s because she’s nervous) about some asshole customer who came through The Wreck the other day, that this feeling is better than getting barreled out at Rixon’s on a perfect summer’s day. Better than getting high on the hammocks with John B after washing down the boat following a fishing trip. Better than sex — yes, even sex with _Kie._ This is better than the first time they slept together, or that one time she fucked him in the backseat of his truck after a surf session at Rixon’s, or the last time it had happened, when they’d made this little smudge of a kid, when he’d thought she was leaving him for good, and he was sad and mad and just wanted to feel her against him, be inside her, one more time. 

This is the feeling: he is going to become a father, and the mother of his child is his best friend, and his heart is so full that he swears his ribs might split with the joy of it. 

There are complications to this, of fucking _course._ JJ knows he’s got no business being a dad, _especially_ at nineteen. His life is never gonna be the same after this — for better, or for worse. And he has _no_ idea what their friendship or relationship — or whatever the hell this is — is going to be like after today. But does it even matter?

This kid’s gonna have two parents who love it and that’s more than JJ could have ever asked for when he was a child. 

And so JJ lets himself feel happy for once in his goddamn life, feels the wind on his face as he drives, and the warmth of Kie’s hand in his when he reaches for her once again.

* * *

That evening, the Pogues (plus Sarah — although at this point she’s a Pogue through and through) meet up for dinner at the Chateau. JJ meets Kie at the door when she arrives.

“So, are we...you know…?” he whispers as he ushers her inside.

She knows what he means. Are they going to tell the others tonight? “Yeah,” she says as she kicks off her sandals at the door and moves round him, her hip bumping his as she brushes past. “Let me handle it,” she calls over her shoulder as she walks out to the hammocks where the rest of their friends are. 

He follows dumbly after her and plops down into one of the empty hammocks. To his surprise, Kie sinks down next to him instead of cuddling up with Sarah like she normally does when they’re all out here like this.

Pope raises his eyebrows and lifts his can of beer to his lips. Sarah winks at them. John B, scrolling through Instagram on his phone, notices nothing.

JJ feels on edge, like he used to feel when he knew he was about to be called out for something by a teacher and sent to the principal’s office. Kie asked him to follow her lead and let her handle the telling of the baby news, and he’s fine with letting her do that. But he hates this awful sense of foreboding, made worse by the feeling of the side of Kie’s warm body pressed up against his. He’s hyper aware of everything right now — and hyper anxious about everything that could go _wrong_. 

Things between Kie and him have already changed so much as a result of this situation. What if it alters the dynamic of the Pogues for good, too? What if, despite all Pope’s talk of being over Kie, he doesn’t wanna be friends with JJ anymore, because admitting a crush on a boy’s ex-girl is a _whole_ lot different than _impregnating_ said girl?

“You want a drink, Kie?” asks John B a moment after she sits down.

She smiles and holds up her hand. “No, thanks.”

JJ bristles, ready to go on the defence on behalf of Kie against any leading questions asking why not. _She’s not feeling well. She doesn’t like...beer?_

John B stares at her quizzically, and JJ swallows down the bile rising in his throat. He feels Kie suck in a deep breath beside him. _Uh oh._

“JJ knocked me up,” Kie blurts, out of the blue, as a way of explanation. 

JJ says, _“_ Straight out with it, huh?”

John B says, “He fucking _what?”_

Pope says, “You’re kidding. No _way._ ”

Sarah says nothing but bites her lip and smiles.

“It’s true,” JJ admits with a sigh after he takes a moment to breathe. “She’s pregnant.”

“You two were _sleeping together?!”_ John B exclaims, clambering out of the hammock to stand with his arms crossed like an angry father who feels personally victimised by the behaviour of his child. The scowl that thunders across his face kind of pisses JJ off.

“We only did it once!” JJ argues in defence, the lie sour on his tongue. “It was an accident!”

“And _why_ don’t I _believe_ you?”

“What’s it to you anyway, JB?” JJ asks, standing up to face his friend with a matching snarl on his face while Kie calls his name and tries to pull him back down. 

“Pogues don’t mack on other Pogues, bro! Pogues don’t get other Pogues _pregnant!_ ” John B turns and wildly gestures to Pope, who is sitting on his own in one of the hammocks, quietly sipping his beer and watching shit hit the fan. “How do you feel about this, Pope? Surely you’re not okay with this?!”

“I’m really okay with it — just a little surprised,” Pope says at the same time as Sarah shouts, “Stop it, John B!” and Kie hisses, “JJ, sit down!”

“Fine,” JJ grunts, staring daggers at his best friend who is staring daggers in return as he sinks back into his seat. _This is why I was scared of telling them!_ he thinks, _I knew they’d overreact._ He tries to relax and unclench his fists, but John B is still towering over him, and he kind of feels like punching the guy. He hates it when John B acts like this — like everything is a personal offence, like JJ does things on purpose to hurt him. Just to spite him, JJ bites, ”Alright, maybe it wasn’t just one time. Maybe more like three or four or nine times—“

“JJ!” Kie chirps, thumping him in the shoulder. He winces, then turns his head to look at her. 

“What?” he shrugs, rubbing his now-sore shoulder. “You’re literally pregnant, Kie, what’s the point in lying about it now?”

“How long has this been going on for?” John B demands, colour drained from his face, ignoring Sarah’s tugs at the sleeve of his shirt as she tries to get him to sit down. 

“Not long,” JJ says. 

“A while,” Kie corrects. JJ’s heart leaps.

“Sarah knew,” he sputters, sick of the way John B is glaring at him and selfishly wanting to take some of the heat off of himself.

John B turns sharply to his girlfriend and asks, “You did?”

Sarah rolls her eyes. “Kie made me promise I wouldn’t tell! Girl code, babe. C’mon.”

Finally, John B sighs and sits back down onto the hammock. “Oh my God,” he says, head in his hands. “You’ve _all_ been lying to me?”

“Hey,” Pope pipes up, “I haven’t lied at all. Like, ever.”

“I know, Pope,” John B grumbles. “I know.”

JJ sucks in a breath and reaches up to scratch the back of his neck. “Hmm, well, I actually told Pope a few weeks ago.”

“ _Pope?!”_ John B screeches. 

“Yeah, okay, but I technically didn’t lie about _not_ knowing!” pleads the boy in question, holding his hands up in defence. 

“None of us lied!” Kie shouts over the voices of the arguing boys. Once they’re quiet, she continues, “We just...neglected to share some information.”

John B crosses his arms over his chest and scowls. “All I’m hearing is that all of you assholes think I’m not good at keeping secrets.”

“That would be correct.”

“Fuck you, JJ.”

Unlike earlier words exchanged between them, these don’t have much sting. JJ sends a cheeky smirk and a head nod his way, and John B’s frown visibly softens as Sarah pulls him close and starts carding her fingers through her boyfriend’s thick hair. Absently mirroring her friend, Kie begins to run her fingernails across the nape of JJ’s neck. He leans back into her touch, letting himself be soothed by it. She’s always been good at calming him down. 

After a long stretch of awkward silence, Pope sets his empty bottle down on the dirt, sticks out a leg to push himself in the hammock, and raises an eyebrow at Kie and JJ. “So,” he says, clearing his throat. “Are you guys _together_ then?”

“Uh—“ mumbles JJ.

“Well—” starts Kie. 

“We haven’t really—”

“—talked about it—”

“But she kissed me in the parking lot today, so—”

“ _JJ!_ ”

“What?!” he exclaims, the words half a laugh, half a rush of breath escaping his lungs as Kie thuds her fist into his shoulder again. “I’m sorry! I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it!” It was a little more than a peck, but it was a kiss, and paired with the experience of seeing their baby move on screen, it had made him feel like a million bucks. He knows she’ll be mad that he told everyone about it, but like he said before: she’s pregnant, and the day’s already been weird enough, so what do they have to lose?

Kie rolls her eyes and shoves him out of the hammock. “Oh, my _God,”_ she groans, although he sees the hint of a smile on her face. “Go get me a drink, why don’t you?”

He obliges with a grin and trudges up to the porch where a cooler full of beer (and lemonade, which will be for her — Sarah must have got it specially) sits and takes three drinks: one for him, one for Kie, and one for Pope, because JJ had noticed his friend had finished his drink. 

He eavesdrops on the conversation happening between Pope and Kie behind him as he unscrews the caps on all three drinks. 

“So you guys are like...you’re gonna be…” 

“Parents, yeah. We had the ten-week scan today. Baby looks healthy, thank God.”

“It’s so tiny,” JJ interjects as he turns back towards the hammocks. “It looks like a bean.”

“Holy fuck,” curses John B, but the boy’s got a softer kind of look on his face than he had before. JJ thinks that maybe his friend just needs to warm up to this idea a little more: that Kie and JJ have seen each other naked, and that _from_ those experiences has come the creation of a potential sixth member of the Pogues. He recognises it would be a lot to take in all at once, and decided that he’ll start having more grace for John B — even if he doesn’t deserve it. 

And so that’s that. The cat is out of the proverbial bag. JJ would call this a success, as while there was some drama there were no flying fists and that’s always a win when it comes to him and John B. (He’d never fight with Pope like that — not even as a joke). 

Kie grins and thanks him as he sits back down next to her and hands her the lemonade. She lifts his arm and tucks herself into his side, kicking her feet up and talking shit with Sarah while her head rests against his chest like it’s the most natural thing in the world. 

Yeah, he’d say today was a success. 

* * *

They’re doing the dishes after dinner while Pope, Sarah and John B watch The Gentlemen in the lounge. Kie and JJ had both seen it relatively recently (the fifth or sixth time things had _happened_ ), so they had volunteered to clean up. 

JJ washes and Kie dries. They work in silence for a long while, until JJ swallows his pride and asks, “So...about what Pope asked earlier...are we together?”

It’s a question he’s been pondering since maybe the third or fourth time they’d hooked up. He knew on a surface level that they were just friends-with-benefits, because that was what they’d discussed. But sometimes, when she’d kissed him, it had felt like _more._ And then the months went on and they spent more time alone together, more nights sleeping over where there was no sex involved at all, mornings and evenings spent cooking meals for each other and watching stupid shit on Netflix while cuddled up on the couch...

JJ’s never had a girlfriend, but being with Kie for the past six months had felt like being in some kind of a relationship to him. And now they’re having a _baby_ together, and from the way Kie had been acting around him today (the kiss in the parking lot already feels like days ago but it had happened and it was real and he had _liked_ it) he wonders if she’s been asking herself this question too.

(The irony of him and Kie having yet another relationship-altering conversation in the kitchen of the Chateau does not escape him.)

He’s not surprised, though, when she finishes drying the last cup, puts it away, then props her hip against the counter, looks over at him with a smirk and says, “No.”

He empties the sink of water, dries his hands on a towel, mimics her stance leaning against the counter and grins. “No?”

“You’d have to ask me to be your girlfriend first,” she teases, brown eyes sparkling. 

“And what if I did?”

“I’d say no.” There’s that cheeky grin again — the one that rounds her cheeks and crinkles her eyes. “Let’s give it time. Then we’ll see.”

“Time? Okay, I’ve got time.” He acts like he’s joking but he’s really not. Kie’s not stupid — he knows she’ll be seeing straight through the bullshit and the teasing, right to his heart, which is currently displaying a giant neon sign that reads KIARA CARERRA: WOULD YOU LIKE TO BE THE LOVE OF MY LIFE?

(Okay, maybe not _love_ — not yet. But something super fucking close.)

He thinks about kissing her — just planting one on her, out of the blue, before either of them have a chance to think much about it. In his imagination, she fold herself into him like she used to do, throwing herself completely into the kiss, her mouth moving against his and her fingertips sweeping the back of his neck and back like she was drawing magic spells on his skin—

But then she’s changing the subject and talking about going to therapy, which is definitely a mood-killer, although he’s actually glad she brought it up as he’s been thinking about going to counselling ever since she first mentioned it to him. 

“You know how I mentioned a therapist or something a while back?” she says as she pushes her hip off of the counter and goes to start putting away the clean and dry plates. 

He moves to help her. (If he’s honest with himself, the simple domesticity of completing a task like this together is almost as hot as watching her come apart around his fingers.) “Yeah?”

“What are your thoughts on that? Now that we’ve had the scan and, you know, things are looking like they’re…” _Like everything is happening for real, like this isn’t a dream_ , he imagines she’d have said if she hadn’t trailed off and shrugged instead.

He swallows hard, and all thoughts or memories of hooking up with Kie go out the window to be replaced by the familiar yet always chest-tightening feeling that accompanies JJ’s deep thoughts about fatherhood and his capability for it. “I think— I— maybe it _would_ be good for me to go and talk to someone,” he says as he stacks cups in one of the cupboards. Raucous laughter and faint television chatter comes from the living room. He absently wonders what part of the movie everyone’s up to. “When this kid is born...I want our kid to be proud to call me Dad. I want to do everything I can to make sure it never ends up like—” _Like me_ , is the unspoken thought.

“That sounds like a good idea, J.” He loves when she calls him that: a nickname within a nickname, and something just for him. “Do you want me to come with you?”

“Maybe? Yeah.”

She stacks away the last of the clean dishes then turns to look at him. “Okay. Okay, cool. I’ll set it up then. Hey—“ she reaches out to rest a hand on his bicep. Her palm is warm through the fabric of his ratty Kildare County t-shirt. “I’m really proud of you. I know you’re probably fucking terrified because I’m _also_ fucking terrified but—“ she squeezes his arm lightly and smiles bitter sweetly. “I’m glad I’m doing this with you.”

She is beautiful in the twilight. He wants to run his fingers through the elaborate braids of her hair, touch his fingertips to the corners of her smiling mouth and her dark eyebrows, press his hand to her chest and feel her heartbeat ( _da dum da dum da dum_ just like their baby’s). He thinks he could kiss her. Is right about to when he hears a strange yelp coming from outside the front door.

“Did you hear that?” JJ asks, more to himself than Kie. 

There’s the sound again, except this time it sounds like a barking dog. JJ looks quizzically at Kie, who raises her eyebrows and says, “Let’s go find out what that is.”

She opens the front door and finds a hungry-looking yellow-furred mutt of a dog sitting on the front step. JJ peeks his head around Kie’s and stares at the animal, and the animal stares right back with big, watery eyes. It whimpers and lowers its head. 

“Hey little buddy,” Kie coos, crouching down to the dog’s level. “What are you doing here? You got a collar? You want some food?”

The dog just whines and presses into Kie’s hand when she reaches out to pet his matted fur. “Look, JJ, it’s all muddy. We should give it a bath.”

Kie’s always been the environmentalist, animal-rights-activist, save-every-stupid-bird-that-flies-into-the-windows-at-The-Wreck one of the group. JJ? Not so much. He doesn’t have a huge affinity for dogs. Not since the terrier his dad had when he was a kid almost ripped his pinky finger off once. 

But Kie is staring up at him with a pleading look, and the dog is looking up at him too with literal puppy dog eyes, and with everything that’s happened today he decides this might as well happen too. 

“Fine,” he sighs. Kie yelps with joy and ushers the dirty mutt of a dog inside. 

And so the two of them, helped somewhat by Pope, John B and Sarah who have paused their movie to take an interest in their new guest, bathe the dog (they find out its a boy this way, too). They feed it a little leftover hamburger, give it a few loving pats and some water, then send the animal on its way.

JJ thinks that’s the end of it — a random event to cap off the end of a long and very surprising day.

Except it's not.

Every night for a week, the dog’s sitting on JJ’s doorstep when he gets home, usually already tucking into a bowl of dog biscuits that Sarah had bought for it. John B suggests putting up posters to see if anyone’s missing their dog, but no one comes to claim him. JJ, having grown much fonder of the dog over a week of visits and the realisation that the animal was far too old and placid to be the kind of dog that tries to eat a finger, takes that as a sign from above that he was meant to be his.

He announces to the rest of the Pogues one evening while they’re all hanging out at the Chateau that he’s decided to keep the dog. Said dog is already sitting in his new favourite spot — laid across JJ’s feet as he sits on one of the armchairs in the living room. 

“I’m naming him Fisher,” JJ says after John B assures him it’s all good that the dog will be staying. 

Kie thinks the name is a little corny ( _Fisher? Really? How original, considering we live in a fishing town_ , she protested), but Pope and John B think it’s cool, so majority rules in favour of the name. 

“Fisher’ll be good practice for when the baby comes, huh?” John B grins. 

“Really, John B?” Sarah retorts. “You’re seriously comparing looking after a dog to having a _baby?_ ”

JJ settles back into the armchair, Fisher docile and warm at his feet, and listens to Sarah and John B argue with each other about the differences and similarities between looking after a newborn and a puppy. Kie smiles slyly at him from her place on the couch across from him, then rolls her eyes and nods her head in the warring couple’s direction as if to say _can you believe those idiots?_ JJ shrugs and grins back, wordlessly replying _what can you do? They’re_ our _idiots._

Fisher yawns and rubs his big yellow head against JJ’s shin. He reaches down to pat the dog’s back and ruffles the fur behind his ears.

He wonders if Fisher and the baby will become good friends. He thinks they probably will, and smiles. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you from the BOTTOM of my heart for all the support for this story so far — the kudos, the comments, the tumblr anons, the DMs where i have made some lovely new friends — all of it has been amazing ! feedback like this honestly makes me wanna write sooo much more. it’s made this story so special to me. thank u all!!
> 
> p.s. this chapter is dedicated to my friend tiffany (@jjskiaras on tumblr, @daylightspeaks on ao3!) — it’s her birthday today !!!! thank you for all the INCREDIBLE ideas and support you’ve given me for this story. you are the BEST!


	10. second generation pogues

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> jj and kie do adult things like shop for baby clothes, go to therapy, and tell everyone but the other person that they've caught feelings. super mature, guys.
> 
> we've had four chapters in kie's perspective and four in jj's. from now on, we'll be swapping back and forth as i see fit hehe. good times ahead! enjoy my friends, and thank u soooo much for all the continued support and beautiful reviews xoxo
> 
> ALSO songs for this chapter are ‘two seasons’ by slow hollows, ‘share this dance’ by mild orange, and ‘soco amaretto lime’ by brand new

The weeks that follow the adoption of Fisher and the first sonogram almost feel like a regular summer break. (Keyword: almost. Because, you know, the _baby_.)

Kie and JJ haven’t kissed since that afternoon in the parking lot of the family doctor’s, but they hold hands when they walk, now. And when they’re all settling down in the lounge to watch something on the TV, Kie will slot herself into JJ’s side like that has been her place all along, and he’ll run his fingers through her hair and gently rub her shoulders until she’s practically falling asleep in his lap. It’s a different kind of closeness than the physicality they’re used to, but somehow it feels _more_ intimate than what they had before. (They still haven’t really talked about what this all means, of course.)

Sarah morphs herself into becoming a mother, a sister, a midwife _and_ a best friend as Kie keeps the baby a secret from her parents still. She keeps her phone off silent all hours of the night, always ready to pick up a call. She keeps her wallet open for early-morning pharmacy trips to get anti-nausea medicine or to satisfy any late-night Subway sandwich cravings. She keeps clean sheets on the spare bed in the Chateau for when Kie needs to get out of the house, and doesn’t blink an eye when Kie falls asleep in JJ’s room instead. Sarah is kind and loving and warm and Kie is immensely grateful.

Pope and John B ease into acceptance of the baby news — and then embrace it wholeheartedly. When JJ’s not around, Pope makes Kie craving snacks any time she wants, never batting an eyelid at her crazy calls for extra-spicy noodles and Hot Cheetos dipped in strawberry icecream. John B tries his best to be supportive by issuing pregnancy books for him and JJ from the Kildare County Library, and together they pore over them on rainy afternoons, trying to figure out what the fuck Braxton-Hicks contractions are and how to spell _caesarean_. 

The end of summer rolls around quicker than expected. One minute it’s the middle of July, and all the five of them do is surf, sunbathe, and watch shit on the TV when it rains. Then Kie blinks and it’s the end of August, and most of their remaining time together is spent cuddled up on the couch, sharing blankets and stories and smiles.

Each Pogue holds tight to the memories made in these twilight days, where the five of them are the only ones who know about the baby. While Kie’s fucking _terrified_ of the prospect of telling her parents and others about the pregnancy, she knows she can’t hide her burgeoning baby bump forever, and the day will come soon when she will have to spill the proverbial beans and face the wrath of her father. Right now, though, she loves that the secret is kept to the five of them, and with every day that passes, she grows more and more excited about the idea of loving and nurturing this ‘little smudge’, as JJ so eloquently calls it.

A few days before Sarah and the others leave for their sophomore year of college, she decides that Kie needs to be treated to a shopping spree. A _baby clothes_ shopping spree.

Kie had protested at first — _I don’t wanna drop coin on some shitty baby clothes that were probably made by literal children in Bangladesh_ ; _plus, I’ve still got that Royal Merchant gold_ — but Sarah had promised they’d only visit the upmarket ethical and organic baby stores, and that she would be treating her friend to all the purchases no matter what.

Honestly, that second clause of the deal was much harder to convince Kie of than the first. Kie’s never liked charity, and it took a great deal of grumbling for Sarah to persuade Kie to let her pay. _I’m not gonna be around for much longer_ , Sarah had said, _and I wanna make sure you’ve got everything you need while I’m still here._

(Kie thought she hid that pang of loneliness at the thought of Sarah leaving again behind a smile pretty well.)

They find an outlet mall with stores that stock the kind of clothes Kie is looking for around a half-hour’s drive from Kildare (far enough away that it was unlikely they’d run into anyone they knew). 

To her surprise, Kie actually _enjoys_ the shopping. She likes running her hands over the racks of soft baby clothes, all beautiful earthy colours like maroon and brown and forest green. She likes looking at the tiny baby shoes and imagining a little kid with her hair and JJ’s eyes running around in them. Up until now, she hadn’t paid much mind to things like bottles and bibs and strollers, but today she’s finding the task of comparing prices and picking out items in cute colours to be actually pretty fun.

She likes the dreaming, too. What will the kid look like? What will their voice sound like? Will they be more like her or JJ? 

“I think it’s gonna be a girl,” Kie says absentmindedly with a smile as they browse the newborn clothing aisle.

“Really?” Sarah asks while inspecting a miniature Adidas sneaker. “How come?”

“I don’t know,” Kie shrugs. “I just have a feeling.”

Sarah smiles brightly and Kie is reminded of how beautiful her best friend is. _Unfair_ , really. When Kie and Sarah had first become friends, before all that shit that went down in tenth grade, Kie had been right in the middle of her fourteen-year-old _do I like boys or girls or both or neither?_ dilemma. Sarah had been taller than Kie and slim and blonde and athletic and kind and always wore this shade of pink gloss that made her lips glitter in the sun. Kie had thought for a while that she liked girls — and she still thinks she does, just a bit — but that had changed with the kiss from JJ at John B’s birthday party. 

And yes, it’s not a regular occurrence that a kiss from an inexperienced, gangly-limbed, bum-fluff-growing ninth grader causes a girl to decide she is almost exclusively heterosexual, but consider this — it was the first kiss Kie had ever had, and JJ had tasted like beer and coconuts, and he hadn’t made fun of her afterwards when her braces had clashed against his lips. And then all that shit went down with Sarah, and in the aftermath Kie decided that dating boys was just a whole fuckin’ lot easier.

Which isn’t to say she’s never appreciated Sarah’s beauty, especially the way she grew into her wide smile and long legs. It’s just a different kind of appreciation now — a soft, quiet adoration for a good friend rather than a bug-eyed, gut-twisting fascination with a girl she barely knew.

“A girl would be cute,” Sarah says, pulling Kie out of her reverie. “Have you guys thought of a name yet?”

“No,” Kie sighs. “We haven’t talked about it. I was thinking…” she pauses to collect her thoughts and to rub the soft cotton of a playsuit between her fingers. Deciding she likes it, she puts the warm brown-coloured suit in her shopping cart (which is already three-quarters full). “I have an idea for a middle name?” Kie continues. “Georgia — after his mom. I know he misses her a lot. I think it would mean a lot to him.”

“That’s so sweet, Kie,” Sarah replies. “I think he’d love that.” Then, a long pause in conversation as they rifle through the racks of clothes. When Sarah speaks again, it’s with a tentative, careful tone. “When are you planning to tell your parents?”

Kie fights down the bile that rises in her throat at the unwelcome reminder of her situation -- that she’s fifteen-fucking-weeks pregnant and her parents still don’t know. It’s a mess, honestly. “Sometime soon, I think. I can’t hide _this_ forever,” she says decisively, running a hand over the bump under her linen playsuit. “I don’t own _that_ many flowy dresses, and there’s only so many nights a week I can spend at the Chateau without making my parents suspicious.”

Sarah chuckles at that. “Speaking of sleeping over…” she presses. “How are things with JJ?” Sarah tries to keep her voice light and teasing, but Kie sees straight through the faked-nonchalance and rolls her eyes.

“And how did I know that question would come up today?” Kie says, raising an eyebrow. Sarah responds by playfully swatting at her shoulder as they walk down the baby hats aisle. Then deciding she owes it to herself and Sarah to be honest (because the list of people she can be brutally honest with these days is very fucking small), Kie says seriously, “Um...I don’t know, really. We’re...friends, I guess? Friends having a baby together.” She swallows hard and sighs. “ _Fuck_ , why is my life like this.” The last sentence is meant to be a question but falls flat, which makes Sarah giggle again at the absurdity of it all.

“Friends, huh?” Sarah teases. “You kissed him that one day after the ultrasound, though, right? That doesn’t sound like _just friends_ to me.”

“Yeah, well, that was weeks ago,” Kie replies, waving her friend away with one hand. Now it’s _her_ turn to fake that nonchalance. “And we haven’t exactly _talked_ about it.”

“Well, maybe you _should_ talk about it,” Sarah huffs, rolling her eyes. “God, you two are pathetic. So much tension could be resolved between you two if you just _communicate_. First rule of relationships: communication is key.” She pulls a miniature forest green wool beanie from a shelf and holds it up for Kie’s inspection. “Hey — what about this?”

“Yeah, that’s cute,” Kie says, then nods her head for Sarah to put it in the cart. “We’re not in a relationship, though, so…” she continues, trailing off mid-sentence, already knowing she’s fighting a losing battle.

“Yeah, right, okay,” Sarah snorts. “You can keep telling yourself that.”

“ _Anyway_ ,” Kie says, pretending to be completely exasperated with the conversation but only feeling a fraction of it. “Are you excited to go back to school?”

“Yes. No? I don’t know.” Sarah scrunches up her nose as she picks through the sale section. “I love college, don’t get me wrong, and I love living with John B, even if he is a fuckin’ idiot eighty percent of the time. But I just...I’m gonna miss having you around,” she says, turning to Kie with a bittersweet smile that makes something twist up in Kie’s gut. “It’s always hard to say goodbye, but—” she shrugs, “you’re going through a huge life change and it sucks that I won’t be able to be there for you.”

Kie must not have digested her lunch properly because it definitely feels like something is stuck in her throat. “I’ll miss you too, Sarah.” Saying those words — being open and honest about how she feels — combined with these fucking hormones leads to a few tears slipping out from the corners of Kie’s eyes. “Fuck,” she grumbles, wiping away the wetness on her cheeks with the back of her hand. “Now I’m crying in the underwear section of a baby store.”

“Hey,” Sarah smiles with a trembling lip, tears leaking out of her eyes too. “At least you can just blame it on the hormones. _I_ just look crazy.” She sucks in a deep breath then gently wipes her under eyes free of any makeup residue. “Is my mascara running?”

“No, you’re good.” Then, with a strangled sigh, Kie tugs Sarah forward into a crushing hug. Sarah’s arms come up quickly to wrap around Kie’s waist, the crown of her head smushed against Kie’s nose. Kie breathes the smell of her fruity shampoo in deep, savouring the moment. “I love you so much,” she whispers.

“I love you too,” Sarah whispers back. After a moment, they both pull away and wipe the remaining tears from their eyes. “Right,” Sarah says after clearing her throat. “Now let’s go pay for all this shit.”

By the end of the afternoon, Kie’s car is stacked full of shoe boxes (Sarah had splurged on a tiny pair of baby Birkenstocks as well as some more practical footwear for newborns then up to a few months old, so Kie wouldn’t have to come out shopping again for a while) and bags of clothes. It’s all nice stuff, and Kie’s so grateful to have it — and that Sarah was so generous in paying. 

But that’s not what Kie has loved most about this particular outing with her best friend. What she loves the most is the feeling she has when they’re driving home, listening to some Top 40 bullshit on the radio but singing their hearts out regardless, the hot late-summer wind that streams in through open windows whipping at their hair. 

It’s the feeling Kie gets when she looks over at her best girl and reminds herself _I have good people around me: Sarah, and Pope, and John B. And JJ. It’s all gonna be okay._

No matter what her parents say. No matter what she says to herself. She — and this baby — will be just fine.

* * *

While the girls are out shopping for baby clothes, the boys go surfing then kick back with some beers in the hammocks.

Of course, the conversation about the quality of that day’s waves soon turns into one about Kie and JJ’s baby.

“This baby’s gonna be, like, a second generation Pogue,” John B says, cracking open his third Miller Lite.

“The birth of a dynasty,” Pope nods.

“My kid’s gonna be older than all of yours by a long shot,” JJ says. “Unless Sarah starts popping some out.”

John B waves his hand no. “Uh, no offence, JJ, but that’s _not_ happening. Unlike you and Kie, we’re actually responsible adults and we take protection very seriously.”

“Hey!” JJ exclaims, playfully stretching across his hammock to John B’s and kicking him playfully in the shin. “We _did_ take it seriously — we just slipped up once.”

“That’s what my dad always says: _it only takes one mistake to saddle you with a lifetime of responsibility,”_ Pope says sagely.

“Was Heyward talking about _you_ there, Pope?”

“Shut up, John B.”

“How did it happen, anyway?” John B asks after taking a long swig of his beer. “If you guys were being so careful?”

JJ assumes he’s talking about the time he got Kie pregnant, not the first time ever — or any of the eight consecutive times they’d slept together. “Uh, well, she told me she was leaving for Thailand and we just...did it. Like, one last go before goodbye, or whatever.” He remembers Kie’s wet kisses under the water of the outdoor shower, her hands sliding under the waistband of his board shorts, the way the splintered wood of the weatherboards had pricked at his palms as he’d pressed them against the house. He reaches up to scratch the back of his neck, painfully aware of the blush blooming across his cheeks at the recollection of that one afternoon. But hey, at least he could pass it off as sunburn if any of the boys pointed it out, right?

“That’s a bit romantic,” Pope says.

JJ clears his throat. He wouldn’t exactly call it _romantic._ It was quick and dirty and wet — and not in the good way. And he’s honestly not even sure if _she’d_ gotten off during it, which was kind of bad, since he always makes sure she does. It was memorable only for what had eventuated from it. They’d definitely had more ‘romantic’ encounters, like the morning after the fifth time when she’d stayed over and he’d cooked her breakfast in bed, which she had been stoked about, and chose to express her thanks through things other than words. But the boys don’t need to know any of those very private, intimate details. Kie would probably kill him if she knew he was even _vaguely_ talking about their sex life like he is right now. Not that they even really have a sex life anymore, as much as he wishes otherwise. “Not _really—_ ” he starts, but is cut off by John B’s voice.

“Yeah, we know how you get all sentimental and nostalgic and all that bullshit,” John B interrupts. “Of course it happened like that.”

“Yeah, well, _anyway_ —” JJ sighs. “No protection equals baby. That’s it.”

“And have you done it since then?” Pope asks tentatively. 

“Don’t say ‘it’, Pope, like a fuckin’ prude,” John B laughs. “Call it what it is: you and Kie making sweet, beautiful love.”

“How much have you had, dude? It’s not _making love_ ,” JJ groans, emptying the remnants of his second can of beer into his mouth. “And no, we haven’t, okay?” he admits with gritted teeth.

John B looks confused. “But you kissed her that one time—”

“Okay, well, _she_ kissed _me,_ for starters, and we haven’t really talked about that yet.”

Pope seems surprised, and raises his eyebrows until they seem to almost hit his hairline. “Really? It was weeks ago! Surely you’ve kissed since then. I see you holding hands all the time.” Okay, so JJ’s really glad that Pope isn’t being weird about him and Kie being semi-together. But Pope taking an active interest in the relationship between the two of them? Now _JJ_ feels weird.

It’s all weird. He doesn’t want to talk about any of this: how Kie got pregnant, if they’re still fucking, why they’re not, etc. etc. It’s embarrassing and totally uncool and _not_ something he wants to discuss with his boys.

Again, if this gets back to Kie, she’ll chop his balls off. And then the possibility of having any sex in the future will be ripped cruelly away from him forever. No fucking thanks.

“Yeah, I’ve _definitely_ heard sounds coming from your room when she’s been over. Don’t think I haven’t noticed,” John B winks, like a smug cat who thinks he’s outwitted the mouse. Well, sucks to be you, John B, because in this situation, JJ’s no fucking mouse.

“Those noises are just snores, John B, I promise,” JJ replies, rolling his eyes and crushing up his empty beer can in his fist. “We haven’t done anything in ages.”

“Oh, and you’re _mad_ about it. I see,” John B teases. “You _want_ to keep boinking privates—”

“John B, for God’s sake—” Pope barks.

“—But she won’t _let_ you.”

“It’s not that she won’t let me,” JJ squirms, running a hand tiredly through his hair, his fingers catching on knots made by the strands being tumbled in ocean waves, coated in salt and sand down to his roots. “We just...haven’t talked about it. Like I said before.”

“Communication is key, JJ,” Pope says seriously, peering at him over the rim of his can. “You just gotta tell her how you feel.”

“But what if I don’t _know_ how I feel?” JJ replies, sounding and feeling like a drama-stricken teenage girl.

“Then you figure that shit out. How does she make you feel?”

“Like...I don’t know…” It actually takes less digging than expected for JJ to bring up all the thoughts he has about Kiara Carrera. For one, she scares him. For two, she challenges him. She knows what she wants, and for some reason, at some point in this last year, she decided she wanted him, which makes him feel… “All warm and fuzzy inside?” He grimaces at how ridiculous he sounds, even if it’s the truth. “Shit’s _embarrassing_ , man. I can’t think straight when she’s around.”

“My boy’s in _love_!” whoops John B, almost tipping himself off his hammock.

“I’m not!” JJ corrects hurriedly. “I’m not, I swear. I wouldn’t even know what that feels like.” Love? Love is so different to _like_ or even just _want to fuck._ Love is...love is something he’s never felt. For a girl, at least. He’s pretty sure he loves Pope and John B, but he’s almost smart enough to know that’s not the kind of _love_ people are talking about it when they say that word. He’s not in love with Kie.

(Except sometimes...sometimes it feels like he could be. One day.)

“It feels like…like you can’t think about anything else but her for the longest time.” John B’s face takes on a dreamy expression as he begins to talk about Sarah. It’s kind of cute. “Everything reminds you of her: the songs on the radio, the sound of the waves crashing on the beach, the taste of tequila and lime...And then that fades into something deeper and more real. Like you’d drop anything you’re doing to help her. You’d give her the world if you could.” He shakes his wild head of hair and smiles, leaning further back into the hammock. “Fuck, I mean, I’d _die_ for Sarah if I had to. And I know she’d have my back in the same way. That’s love. Ride or die, baby.” John B raises his can at the other two boys and takes a swig.

“That’s...that’s actually really nice, John B,” JJ admits.

This seems to brighten John B’s smile, and so he says, “I have some poetry I wrote about Sarah if you wanna read it—”

Thankfully, Pope interrupts. “Yep, that’s a no from me.”

“But it’s really good! Here, I’ll just pull up my Notes app—“

“Let’s give it a rest for tonight, buddy,” JJ chuckles. Sarah Cameron’s the only person in the world who appreciates John B’s Notes app poetry (if you can even call it that). And even then, she’s probably pretending just to be nice, which is good on her.

“Fine,” John B grumbles. “You should tell her how you feel though, JJ. For real. Stop fucking around and get serious. A kid is a lifetime commitment. She’s gonna be a part of your life forever, whether you want her to be or not. You better figure out what part she’s gonna play in that, and quick.”

It may be the two-and-a-half cans of beers in his system but John B’s actually making a lot of sense. “Okay, well, it’s all fine and good for me to tell her how I feel,” JJ argues, “but what if she doesn’t feel the same way? What then?”

“I think you already know she at _least_ thinks you’re hot, or she wouldn’t have fucked you so many times,” John B says, and JJ has to admit he has a good point. “That’s a starting point. What do you think, Pope?” he says, turning to the left of him where Pope sits. “You’ve wooed Kie successfully before. Surely you’ve got some insight.”

“I wouldn’t call it wooing, and I definitely wouldn’t call it successful,” Pope huffs with a smile. “The relationship lasted two weeks, tops. I think JJ knows Kie just as well as we do. More, even. How do _you_ think she’s feeling about you?” he asks JJ.

“She— I don’t know, man,” JJ replies, shaking his head. Hair falls into his eyes. He blows it away. “It’s the way she looks at me. Like she sees through all my bullshit, all the way down to the core of me. She’s— no offence to you guys, but she’s my best friend. When you guys left, it was just us two hanging out all the time. And it should have been awkward, but it wasn’t.” He feels as soppy as John B, speaking about Kie like this, but now that he’s on a roll it’s surprisingly not that hard to talk about her and the way she makes him feel. “Being with her just felt...right. And I guess that’s how everything happened — because we were together so much, it felt natural to, you know...It just...it felt good to have that with someone that wasn’t gonna be gone in the morning. And again, it _should_ have been weird, but she never made it that way. I was always waiting for her to text me saying we should stop what we were doing, but that never happened. She kept coming ‘round to hang out, kept showing up to Rixon’s, kept bringing me beers and food after work. She stuck around. And it made me— it makes me feel like— I don’t know— maybe she…” He’s stuck for words now. Actually, he knows _exactly_ what he wants to say — that maybe she might feel something for him that goes beyond their relatively-platonic-fuck-buddy-relationship — but those particular words refuse to dislodge themselves from his throat.

Thank the Lord for Pope because he offers up a continuation of JJ’s sentence that says everything he means. “That maybe she feels the same way about you?”

“Yeah. I guess,” JJ says, resigning himself with a sigh. “Shit’s fuckin’ complicated.”

“Sure is, bud,” nods John B.

“You guys will figure it out, though. I know you will,” Pope smiles encouragingly. “If I learnt anything from being with Kie that one summer, it’s that she’s smart as hell. She knows what she wants. And if she wants you, well...you’ll know.”

JJ grins back, then remembers a conversation he’d had with her earlier that feels appropriate to bring up with the boys. “She’s coming with me to family counselling next week.”

“Really?” John B says, eyebrows raised. “Well, that’s a sign right there.”

“You think so?”

“Like you said,” Pope says, “she wants to stick around. I think that says a lot more than just the words _I like you_ or whatever.”

“I guess so.” JJ takes a sip of his beer and stares up at the trees above him. With the leg dangled over the edge of his hammock, he pushes the edge of John B and Pope’s hammock so it rocks in time with his. “Man, I’m gonna miss you guys,” he says finally, not daring to look over at his friends because he might get all damn teary, and he is _not_ going that far tonight.

“We’ll miss you too, bubba,” says John B, and JJ can hear the smile in his voice. “Oh, hey, also — baby name idea,” he says with sudden urgency. “Sarah and I were talking the other day and I came up with this — how about _Marley?_ ”

“Marley?” JJ asks, turning to face his friend. “Like _Bob_ Marley?”

“Yeah! Well, no,” John B replies, scrunching up his freckled nose. “Not exactly. It’s kind of cool though because you know she loves Bob Marley, so it’s paying homage to him a little bit. _But_ it’s also a great name for a girl _or_ a boy. Marley Maybank. If they take your last name, of course.”

“Not one of the worst ideas you’ve ever had, JB.”

“I know you’re being sarcastic, but thank you, Pope.”

JJ grins. “Hmm. Marley, huh?” _Not too bad, John B. Not too bad at all._

Fuck. Yeah, he’s really gonna miss these two.

* * *

Three days later, Sarah, John B and Pope all leave the Outer Banks once again.

There are more tears this time. 

Saying goodbye to Sarah means saying goodbye to the one woman in Kie’s life that knows about the pregnancy. And sure, there’s always FaceTime and unlimited calling minutes, and the boys are great, but the friendship between her and Sarah is so different and important and _necessary_ during this time of big change. 

Sarah cries again when she embraces Kie for the last time before getting in the van. Pope presses a kiss onto Kie’s forehead when he hugs her goodbye. John B awkwardly pats Kie’s bump and says goodbye in baby talk to the baby inside, which Kie laughs at but lets him do anyway. JJ stands to the side, pretending like he’s removed from all the emotion. Kie knows he’ll probably shed a few tears on his own after they leave, though. She knows he’s not made of stone. She knows he’d take a bullet for the two boys climbing into the driver’s seats of their respective cars, and she knows those two boys would do the same for him.

They stand together at the edge of the driveway and watch the two vehicles pull out and drive away.

 _We always seem to find ourselves here, don’t we, JJ?_ Kie thinks as she glances over at the boy in question. He’s watching the dust fall as the cars disappear from sight with a wistful look on his face, like he always does. The difference with this time is that without even flinching, he reaches across the gap between them to take her hand in his. Their fingers slot together easily, smoothly, naturally.

They stay outside for a few minutes more, hand in hand, heart in heart. The dust has long settled by the time they walk inside. 

* * *

“Hey. What do you think about Marley for a name?” 

They’re on their way to the family therapist Kie had recommended. Kie is driving her car, as JJ’s truck’s brakes are wearing thin and need replacing, a job that he hasn’t found the time to do in between pulling extra shifts and working overtime at the garage. It’s not to get any more money than they have at the moment -- the gold they stole from the Royal Merchant disaster will keep them going for a long, long time. It’s more that JJ’s hoping that all the extra work he’s putting in will butter up his boss so he feels gracious when JJ asks him for more paternity leave than he’s allowed.

“Marley?” Kie echoes. He watches her scrunch up her nose and murmur the name a couple times, like she’s chewing it in her mouth, testing for the taste of it. “Marley...hmm…”

“John B came up with it,” he says, shifting the blame ( _well, he did!_ ) to his friend just in case she hates the name.

“Really? That’s surprising. It’s actually kind of cool,” she smiles finally. “I like it.”

JJ’s held breath releases in a huff. _Thank God_ , he thinks, having spent the past four days dreaming of a _Marley Maybank._ Or Carrera. Carrera could totally work too. “Cool,” he says, feigning nonchalance. “Yeah, I like it too. Even though it was John B who thought of it.”

“Yeah, even then,” Kie giggles. “I guess it works for a boy or a girl, huh?”

“I guess so.”

He watches her smile out of the corner of his eye. Is she thinking the same thing he is? Dreaming of this future baby with the name Marley? Does she want it to be a boy? A girl? “Hey, something else I was thinking about,” he starts after clearing his throat and redirecting his gaze to the road in front. “I know usually kids take the dad’s last name, but we’re not married, so…”

She’s quiet for a moment, and the silence is nerve-wracking. When she speaks, it’s with a soft voice. “I don’t know,” she says. “What do you want?”

 _What does he want?_ Good question. He’s got no fucking idea.

Well, that’s not entirely true.

The Maybank name, when attached to his father Luke (and by some extension, JJ and all the fuckups he’s made over the years), carries with it dark connotations. JJ never liked being a Maybank. Never liked the way people in town grimaced when they heard the surname. Never liked the way teachers called it out in class while he was pissing around and getting into trouble. Then there was that one time, after a beating, when his father had snarled at him: _you’re not fit to be a Maybank. I wish to fucking hell and back you’d never been born._

Yeah, no. His family name has never brought any kind of joy into his life. Which is why the baby taking the Carrera surname may be the better option.

But then…

They’re going to this family therapy session to help him work through all the dark shit about his dad, right? What if giving the baby the Maybank name would be like an act of rebellion -- taking something shitty and making it good. Twisting its meaning from something that recalls abuse, hatred and general asshole-ry to something beautiful, and pure, and perfect. Maybe that would be the first step in creating a legacy for his family that goes beyond the sins of his father.

He wants his child (and any future children) to be _proud_ to have JJ Maybank as their dad. He wants them to be proud of the name. Perhaps this is a way he can move forward and make peace with the past.

He doesn’t say any of this to Kie, because it feels almost _too_ personal. At least too private to talk about so casually while they’re only five minutes away from the counselling clinic. This will be a conversation to have another time. “I don’t know,” he eventually says, punctuating the (half-true) admission with a shrug. “I haven’t thought about it that much.”

 _Liar,_ says the voice in his head. _You think about everything way too fucking much._

* * *

The therapist’s name is Jenny Garcia and she’s a nice-enough looking woman with a smile that seems genuine. She welcomes JJ and Kie into her office and they sit next to each other on plush leather chairs facing Jenny’s desk. Everything feels very formal and official. It’s a little unnerving.

But Kie doesn’t have a reason to feel nervous, really. They’re here for JJ to talk about _his_ family, not hers. And she’s here for _him._

“Tell me a little about yourselves and why you’re here,” Jenny says after she’s explained the code of conduct and how the session might unfold: she’ll ask questions and will write some things down for future sessions if need be, but will keep everything completely confidential. JJ is encouraged to talk as openly as he can.

“Uh, well, so, we’re, uh— we’re having a baby,” JJ mumbles, jabbing a thumb in the direction of Kie’s obvious bump. “And I’ve got a fucked up— oops, sorry—” he grimaces.

Jenny shakes her head and smiles. “That’s okay, JJ. Don’t bother censoring yourself on my part. Just talk how you normally do. Let the words flow out of you.”

Kie sees JJ’s face fold into an awkward smile. “Okay. Sure. Yeah, so I’ve got a pretty fucked up relationship with my father, and I kind of wanted to get it sorted out before I have my own kid. You know, so I don’t pass any of that abusive shit on or anything.”

Jenny raises her eyebrows. “First things first, JJ: you need to know that this is bound to be a long process of dealing with your past and your relationship with your father. It will not all be fixed in one session. And your healing will take place outside of these sessions, too. This will be a lifetime process of undoing what your father has done.” Her voice is so calming yet so firm. Kie doesn’t understand how that works.

JJ squirms in the seat next to her and fiddles with the buttons of his shirt. Like with their trip to the ultrasound clinic, JJ has dressed up for the occasion in a nice shirt and jeans without holes in them. She had felt her heart flutter in her chest when she’d gone to the Chateau to pick him up and seen him in the outfit. It means a lot that he cares enough to do things like this. “Okay,” JJ says, clearly a little crestfallen at the realisation that this might not be as easy as he thought. “I get that.”

Jenny nods. “Alright, then. That’s good. It’s really great that you’re here, JJ. This is the first step to healing.” She turns her gaze on Kie. “And it’s great that you’ve brought your girlfriend for support, too.”

Kie bristles, ready to correct the woman on her mistake. But JJ just looks at Kie with teasing in his eyes, smiles, and says, “Yeah, she’s awesome.”

(She knows he’s just trying to avoid an awkward conversation about their predicament, but it kind of makes her heart explode.)

The rest of the hour goes like this: Jenny asks questions. JJ answers them, mostly truthfully (except for the time he originally says that the abuse from his dad _wasn’t that bad,_ which Kie knows, from experience helping patch up open wounds on JJ’s face, is complete bullshit). Kie sits in relative silence, only talking when called on, focusing instead on being a steady, strong presence for JJ. She rests her hand on his shoulder in moments where it seems like JJ might crack under emotional strain, and holds his hand when he reaches for her as he tries to come up with the words to explain how he feels.

They talk about his rocky relationship with his father. They discuss JJ’s fears about becoming a dad, breaking the cycle of abuse, the potential of unconsciously mirroring behaviours from Luke. They even talk about the challenges that will come with being a young father, and the kind of change he will go through that may alter his experience of fatherhood.

Selfishly, the best part of the session in Kie’s eyes is when, after Jenny asks JJ to describe what life was like after his mother left and the abuse started, Kie gently whispers to JJ that _I can leave the room if you want, JJ, if it’s going to be hard to talk about with me here,_ and he had whispered fiercely back, gripping her hand in his, _no, I need you here with me, please stay._

She had beamed with something that was a mixture of pride and affection as she’d settled back in that leather chair, one hand in JJ’s sweaty palm, one hand on her swelling belly, listening to her boy be the most honest and vulnerable she’s ever heard him be.

Because that’s what JJ is to her now: _her boy._ Not her boyfriend. _Certainly_ not her husband. He’s just her boy. And she’s his girl. And someday soon they’ll need to talk about what that means — mostly because she’d quite like to kiss him again without it being weird — but for now she can settle for this.

* * *

JJ is pleasantly surprised with how the counselling session went. Sure, it was complete fucking agony ripping his heart out like that and laying it on Ms Garcia’s smooth mahogany table. Sure, it wasn’t a walk in the park, digging out all the skeletons in his closet and displaying them for the world (Kie and Jenny’s little notebook) to see. But it was good. It _felt_ good. And it had been incredible to have Kie there with him. She’d been such a great support. He had felt so secure and safe with her fingers firmly intertwined with his as he’d talked.

He feels like a weight has been lifted off of his shoulders as he drives home with Kie in her car, blasting the Hamilton soundtrack with the windows down like he doesn’t have a care in the world. 

When she drops him home, she hugs him across the gearstick and says into his hair, “I’m proud of you, JJ. Really.”

A lump sticks in his throat that he can’t for the life of him swallow down. She smells like jasmine and vanilla. “Thank you, Kie.”

She pulls away from the hug first and flashes him a watery smile. She sucks in a deep breath and then opens and closes her mouth a few times like she’s trying to say something important but the words won’t form on her tongue. Then, in a small, tentative, gentle voice, she says “I want the baby to take your name. If you want it to, of course.”

“Oh...I—” he stutters, trying to wrap his head around the idea. “Yeah. I think I’d like that.” His chest swells to make room for the new bigness of his heart. “What made you decide on that?” 

Kie’s expression softens into a quiet smile. “Hearing you talk about your dad...and then about how you wanted to prove him wrong and be so much better than he could have ever been to you...I feel like…” she shrugs self-consciously. “Like giving this kid the Maybank name could be a rebellion of sorts? Like— _fuck you, dad,”_ she growls, impersonating an angry JJ, _“you couldn’t make me proud to have this name, but I’m sure as hell gonna make sure my kid is._ You know?”

JJ breath wooshes out of his lungs. All he feels is relief. She understands him so well. And isn’t that the most beautiful, intimate thing? “Honestly, that’s exactly what I was thinking. How do you do that?” he asks breathlessly, eyes roaming her lovely face in search of some kind of answer, tripping up on the fullness of her lips, the slow slope of her nose, the baby hairs curling across her forehead.

“Do what?” Her head is cocked in confusion, eyebrows furrowed.

“Know exactly what I mean about things. Read between the lines. Get in my head. Whatever.” He shakes his head in disbelief. “It’s weird.”

“Weird?”

“Weird as in—” JJ waves his hands around like he’s trying to pull the right words from thin air, “—weird like, I’ve never had that kind of thing with someone before. It’s cool. I like it.” He grins, matching hers. Then, with a brazen confidence he doesn’t normally have when he’s around Kie, he follows up with, “Hey, we should—” A pause, to get his words straight. _We should talk. There’s so much I need to tell you. How I can’t stop thinking about you. How I think I might really like you._ “We should hang out more.”

The corners of Kie’s mouth twitch and she bites down on her bottom lip, something that sends his stomach into the stratosphere. Does she know what she does to him? Does she have any idea of the way she makes him feel? “What do you mean? Are you asking me _out_?”

JJ’s eyes widen in shock. “No!” he exclaims, then, “—yes? Not really, I just—” He reaches up to scratch the back of his head — a nervous tic if you’ve ever seen one. “I think it would be cool if we hung out more? Just us two. As friends, if you want,” he adds hurriedly.

He does _not_ expect her coy response. “And if I don’t want?”

 _Don’t want?_ He’s got no fucking idea if she’s talking about the hanging out part or the friends part, so he just stares at her with a confused expression, waiting for her to tell him what she means.

“Sure,” she says finally with a smirk. “Let’s hang out more.”

JJ’s throat goes dry. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Cool. Cool. That’s cool. Okay, then.”

“You’re an idiot.” She grins. His heart grows ten sizes. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> readers i have big news.......i got engaged today !!! AHHH! this is why it's been posted a little later than i promised some lovely anons on tumblr........but i finished the last couple sentences of this when i could find time to this afternoon instead of leaving it for later because i was overflowing with feelings of LURVE and wanted to get this out into the world before the day was over. i hope ya'll liked it.
> 
> thank you to my beta shannon for reading this over for me -- and pointing out that jj and kie still have the gold from the royal merchant LOL oops forgot about that plot point from the prologue....this is y i need u shannon


	11. baby daddy forever

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter has been living rent free in my head for MONTHS and i'm so happy it's here........big things in this one. big feelings and revelations. hope ya'll enjoy
> 
> songs for this chapter: ‘catherine’ - pj harvey; ‘my tears are becoming a sea’ - m83; ‘lover, where do you live?’ - highasakite; ‘this is me trying’ - taylor swift
> 
> p.s. warning for non-explicit sexual content near the end of this chapter (you’ll know when it’s coming up hahah).

Kie makes good on her agreement with JJ. She’s over at the Chateau more afternoons after work than not, sometimes staying the night and sleeping in the spare room.

(While they’ve been having some great soul-baring conversations recently, the one about whether they would like to start sucking face again has not come up. Much to Kie’s disappointment.)

They drink lemonade (hard lemonade for JJ) on the hammocks and watch the sun set. 

They ride JJ’s dirt bike into town to get takeaway fries from Willie’s Diner on Seventh Ave and eat them under a tree down by the water. 

They go out night fishing on the HMS Pogue and catch nothing but seaweed. 

They listen to Marley non-stop, each pretending like they’re not thinking of a baby with a name that matches the voice heard on John B’s shitty radio. 

They go stargazing on the back lawn at the Chateau and hold hands as Kie points out the constellations that Sarah had once showed her. 

They take Fisher for twilight walks along the beach and only tell him off for splashing around and getting them wet once, until they both accept it and let the dog play with them, despite the wet splotches on their pants Fisher creates when he rubs up against their legs.

They talk about their relationships with their parents and their fears about the future, Kie never once asking if Luke Maybank will be involved with the baby, JJ never once pressuring Kie to spill the news to her mom and dad.

The problem with that last point, though, is that Kie is seventeen fucking weeks pregnant. Thankfully, they’re heading into October now and the temperature is a little cooler than it had been earlier, but there’s still only so long she can get away with wearing baggy sweatshirts à la Kylie Jenner, and that time is running out very quickly.

Her mom and dad will have to know. And soon. There’s no way around it.

She lets JJ in on her plan to tell her parents about the baby one evening while they’re eating takeout next to each other on the couch. Stranger Things plays on mute with subtitles on the television screen in front of them, because they like to talk while they eat and watch at the same time. It’s in the middle of a conversation about the objective scariness of the Demogorgon that Kie drops this particular bombshell on him.

“I’m gonna tell my parents tomorrow,” she says through a mouthful of orange chicken (bought, not homemade this time), trying her best to keep her tone light and casual even though her heart is pounding.

The fork stills on the way to his mouth. “You what?”

“My parents—”

“Yeah, yeah, I heard you, I just, uh...Cool.” She watches him swallow hard and shove floppy hair out of his eyes with the back of his fist. _He really should get a haircut,_ she thinks absently. Then again, she does like it long. “Probably about time, huh?” JJ continues with a small smile, pointing to the rounded bit of belly that pokes out from the hem of her baby tee. 

“Probably,” Kie smiles back.

“How do you think they’ll react?” JJ tentatively asks. They’ve talked about this before, but only as some abstract thing that was happening in a far-away time. Like, yeah, of course, _eventually_ both her parents and his dad would find out. That’s completely inevitable. But it’s a little more real, a little more scary, when that time is happening _now._

Kie swallows the last bite of her dinner and washes it down with a glass of lemonade. (Real, hand-squeezed, sour-sweet lemonade has been her craving of late. JJ made her a whole batch last Sunday afternoon.) She puts her plate aside and settles back into the cushions of the couch, angling her head so she’s staring up at the ceiling of the Chateau instead of at the silent television. 

She imagines the look on her parents’ faces when she tells them about the little smudge in her belly. Not that it’s such a smudge anymore, really. She’s read that the baby is about the size of a pomegranate now. That’s decidedly not-smudge. That’s a real little _human._

Her dad’s gonna be pissed. Definitely pissed. He’s always been weird about her and boys — even though Pope Heyward is the _nicest_ boy she’s ever met in her entire life, her dad was wary of him during the few times Kie had brought Pope over to the house while they were a short-lived thing. She knows it’s because she’s their only daughter — their only _child_ — and he’s just being protective. 

Doesn’t mean she appreciates the patriarchal bullshit, though.

Her mom’s probably going to die of shock and then come back to life just to yell at Kie for being irresponsible. Then there’ll be some selfish complaints of _what will the others at the Island Club think now?_ Which will then _hopefully_ turn into her mom being at least a little supportive. Compared to her dad, at least. Kie’s gunning on her mom’s love of kids (she works at the local preschool part time) to pull her through. Imagining herself as a cool young grandmother might ease the shock a little...Kie hopes.

Realistically, he has no idea how her parents will react. Worst case scenario: she gets kicked out of the house and has to go live with JJ. Which wouldn’t objectively be the worst thing in the world. The Chateau’s a pretty sweet place to live. It’s just the brutal chasm that would open up between herself and her parents because of it that she’s not sure she could handle. 

“Not well,” Kie replies to JJ’s question after mulling it over. 

JJ falls back on the couch cushions next to her. His hand finds hers easily, quickly, like it’s second nature to him now. The pads of her fingers brush over the back of his hand. He feels warm and safe and good.

“Everything’s gonna be okay, Kie. I know it.” When he whispers to her like this, like they’re the only two people in the world, it sends a shiver down her spine. 

She pulls their intertwined hands across her body to rest on the top of her belly. His fingers twitch reflexively as they splay over the cotton of her t-shirt and the sliver of skin that peeks out from under it. 

“You’re gonna be a good mom, Kie,” he says softly, looking down at her belly and then up to meet her gaze. And she _is_ gazing at him: he’s the prettiest boy she’s ever seen. 

Starstruck, she says, “So are you.”

“I’m gonna be a mom?!” he quips, his eyes crinkling as he smiles.

Kie blushes as she realises her mistake. “Ha _ha,_ ” she laughs, playfully letting go of JJ’s hand and swatting him away. “You know what I mean.”

“I do,” he grins. His arm goes up to rest across her shoulders and his fingers trace calming circles along the nape of her neck. She sighs into his touch, turning towards him and tucking her head under his chin, eyes fluttering closed. Kie allows herself a few seconds to breath him in — the smell of the laundry detergent she bought for him on his sweatshirt, the scent of saltwater that always lingers — before pulling away and straightening her back.

JJ’s arm falls from her shoulders back to his side. His hand searches for hers again, the heat of his palm a welcome weight. Kie turns her head to face him and realises they’re closer than she expected. Closer than what’s comfortable.

Something jumps in her chest, and a memory appears: the afternoon they had left the clinic after seeing the baby on the ultrasound for the first time, the ecstasy mixed with absolute fear and adrenaline she’d felt when she’d looked at that little smudge on the screen, the way JJ was just so caring, so patient, so _present._ When they’d reached the car and she was so overwhelmed with emotion she couldn’t speak, so she’d kissed him, quick and chaste.

She wants to kiss him again. She wants to _kiss_ him. Kie wants JJ to kiss her and to not stop kissing her, not ever. 

(That’s gotta _mean_ something, right?)

She looks at him and sees something in his eyes that rivals what must be in her own. Something soft. So soft it breaks her heart a little.

JJ blinks. Once, twice. His lips part, ever so slightly. Kie’s eyes trace the line of his mouth, the sharp curve of his jaw, the short, silvery scar that lies just in front of his ear. He leans forward. His nose bumps hers. They share a breath.

Then: “I should go home.” Kie doesn’t quite register the words as they leave her mouth. Why she says them, she’s not sure. JJ seems to be just as confused.

“Hmm?” he murmurs, although he doesn’t pull back.

And _oh_ , it’s that. That’s why.

It’s the fact that he doesn’t move away. It’s the fact that she feels something for JJ that goes beyond friendship, beyond the physical stuff, beyond even hey-you-accidentally-got-me-pregnant-so-I-guess-we’re-in-it-now-huh? It’s the way he touches her, looks at her, takes care of her that insinuates he may feel the same way. 

And that’s fucking _terrifying._

She tries to think for a moment about why that might be: why is she so afraid of falling in love with her best friend, the father of her unborn child? Shouldn’t that be a _good_ thing? A happy thing? The way things are supposed to go?

 _Because you don’t think you deserve him,_ comes the intrusive thought that walks unbidden into her mind. _Because you’re scared that all the love you have to give will never be enough._

It’s true. _Fuck,_ it’s true. And if the love she has for him isn’t enough, what happens then? What happens when she opens herself up, pulls out her heart, hands it to him and says _here, take care of it,_ and he just...doesn’t? He leaves? 

She’s only ever done that once before. With Sarah. And although it was all part of their journey to this friendship they have now, losing her was one of the worst things that had ever happened to Kie.

“Home,” she repeats, although the words taste sour on her tongue. Kie knows deep down that home isn’t with her parents anymore. Not really. Home is _here._ Nevertheless, she continues. “I should really—“

JJ clears his throat and finally pulls away. Kie would sigh in relief, but the tension between them is still there, even though they’re no longer touching. “Oh. Yeah,” he says, colour rising to his cheeks. He tugs the collar of his raggedy sweatshirt like it’s choking him. “Yeah, you should get some rest. Let me know how it goes tomorrow, okay?”

Kie searches his face one more time before getting up to leave. His eyes are shining. “Of course,” she says with a sort of sad half-smile. “Of course.”

* * *

Dinner with her parents is as boring as it normally is -- except for the raging sea of anxiety Kie feels sloshing around in her gut as she dutifully swallows down forkfuls of broccoli. 

She’s been sitting here for a long time, eating her dinner, listening to her parents make small talk about their work days. They try to get that same bland small talk out of Kie too, but since she only responds with one-word answers, they give up pretty quickly and stick with talking only to each other.

Kie’s not _trying_ to be rude. Really. It’s just that there’s a literal tidal wave of terror building inside her stomach at the thought of having to tell her parents about the baby. 

It’s thirty minutes into the meal when her mom asks her a direct question about her health. 

“You’ve been looking a little pale, sweetie,” her mom says with a frown. “You’re not getting sick, are you?”

Sick? No. Not sick. Well, to be fair, she has been throwing up every morning for the past couple of days, but that’s due to another bout of morning sickness, not the flu. Kie weighs up her options here: does she cover it up with a _yeah, mom, I think I’m coming down with something_? Or just tell the godforsaken truth?

Gritting her teeth and bracing for impact, Kie decides to go with the latter. 

“I’m pregnant.”

Silence.

It feels like all the air has been sucked out of the room. The temperature of the space drops below zero. Kie’s hands tremble.

Then, her father, stern-voiced and dark-eyed: “I’m not in the mood for jokes tonight, Kiara.”

Kie swallows. Hard. When she speaks, her throat is already dry. “I wasn’t joking.”

“Explain yourself. _Now._ ” The most unexpected thing about this exchange so far is that her dad hasn’t flown off the handle yet. He’s just staring at her with an unreadable expression on his face, forehead wrinkles deep-set, knuckles white where he clenches them into fists on top of the table.

Kie’s mom reaches out to place her hand on her husband’s arm, mouth twisted into a pained frown. “Honey—“

“It’s okay, Mom,” Kie interrupts, desperate to get this over with. She’ll need to go to the sea after this. She’ll need space after this. She feels an anxiety attack coming on already -- something she hasn’t had in over a year -- and she’s _not_ going to have it at this fucking dinner table. “It was an accident. I— _we_ were careless—“

“And who is this _we?_ ” her dad’s voice rumbles, though still not at a shout, his dark eyebrows (that match her own) rising to his hairline. “Don’t tell me it’s one of those boys from the Cut, Kiara,” he sighs, shaking his head. “What have I always told you? You hang around with dirt, you get dirty—“

And now Kie’s mad. The anger quells the swirling whirlpool of anxiety inside her for a moment and gives her some strength. “Those boys are my _friends_ ,” she retorts, focusing her piercing gaze on her father’s impassive face. “And yes, if you have to know—” she swallows hard again, preparing for the shitstorm that will follow. “JJ Maybank. It was JJ who knocked me up."

Her dad’s head sinks into his hands and groans. _Anyone but the Maybank kid,_ she can imagine him muttering to himself, _it could have been Heyward’s nice boy or even that John B, but she chooses Luke fucking Maybank’s kid._ “For the love of _God—“_

“How did this happen?” her mom exclaims, eyes ablaze, and the intensity of the fire Kie sees in them reminds her that her mettle and her stubbornness comes not just from her father, but her mother, too.

Still, Kie can’t resist the urge to savagely reply, “I think you know how babies are made, Mom.”

Incensed, her mom stands up from her seat of the table, an abrupt movement that shakes cutlery on the plates, and says, “Don’t get smart with me, young lady. What did you think you were _doing_?” 

Kie stands up too, meeting her mom’s eyeline. “I made a mistake, okay?” she shouts, unable to hold it all back now. “It happens! I’m dealing with it!” She waves her arms in the air, gesturing to the ‘it’ that sits inside her belly, which happens to be the wrong thing to do because her dad stands up from his seat, too, and yells:

“A mistake? A _mistake_ is forgetting to change the oil in your car, Kiara!” He slams a palm down onto the table, and an empty glass falls from the corner of it, smashing onto the tiled floor. Either her dad elects to ignore it or is too angry to hear it shatter. “This is not a fucking _mistake!”_

And, uh oh, when her dad curses like that, Kie knows all civility left in this conversation has gone out the window. Therefore, she responds with as much poison on her tongue as her father’s. “Whatever you want to fucking call it,” she spits, crossing her arms over her chest, “it’s happened, and I’m keeping it, and nothing you can say is going to change my mind. If you’re both going to act like this, and not even _try_ to be supportive, I’m leaving.” She pushes her chair out of the way and backs away from the dining table. As a final blow, she adds, “And I’m _not_ coming back.”

“Kiara--”

“No, Mom, that’s it,” Kie shouts, except her voice is wavering now and her eyes are filling with tears. “If you want to contact me, I’ll be staying at JJ’s.” With that, she turns from her parents and makes for the door, crunching a stray piece of glass under her heel.

“Don’t you walk out on us, kid!” comes her dad’s voice at her back.

She whips around to face him, fists balled at her sides. “Why not, Dad?” she yells back. “Aren’t I just doing what I know you want? Making the decision to leave for myself so that you don’t have to, and you don’t have to feel guilty about it? I know you won’t want me around while I’m like _this._ I’ll be an _embarrassment_ to you -- to everything you’ve worked _so fucking hard for_ \-- to the invitations to the Island Club and all the bullshit that comes with this fucking Kook life you so badly want!”

For a millisecond, both her parents are stunned into silence. Then, her mom responds in the softest voice any of them have used all night, “Kiara, you know that’s not what this is about--”

“No, Anna, she’s right,” her dad interrupts. He stares dead straight at Kie. Her dad has always been a handsome man -- tall, tanned, dark hair closely cropped at the sides of his head, salt-and-pepper beard perfectly trimmed. Now, those handsome features make him all the more intimidating. He pulls his broad chest up, crosses his arms, fingers gripping the fabric of his shirtsleeves so tight it looks like they might rip. His voice is low and cutting and cruel when he says, “She _is_ an embarrassment.”

“Mike--”

Saltwater drips into Kie’s mouth. She wonders for a second how that could be possible, then realises that she’s crying. “Thanks for making that clear, Dad,” she whispers. “I’ll see you later.”

“ _Kiara! You--”_

The door slams at her back before she can hear the rest of that sentence.

In a blinding rage, tears blurring her vision, Kie stalks out to her truck, fumbles for the keys in her shorts pocket, climbs inside, throws the gear into drive. The tires squeal as she pulls out of the driveway.

It’s raining, which is very fucking fitting. That, and the shaking of her hands on the steering wheel, make it hard to steer. 

It’s not like she hadn’t known that tonight was going to end up as a complete fucking shitstorm. Her dad had been mad at her for even _thinking_ that she might not ever go to college. Her mom acts like it’s the end of the world every time Kie refuses to shave her legs for a Kook function at the Island Club. She knew that they were not going to react well to something as major as their prized only daughter getting knocked up by the troubled, reckless kid of local deadbeat, Luke Maybank. 

Only...there was a tiny, tiny, _tiny_ part of her that had hoped for the best.

Maybe her parents would have still been mad, but only at the beginning. Then they would have wrapped her in a hug and told her it was gonna be okay, and that they were there for her no matter what, and the warmth of their embrace would remind Kie of being seven and falling asleep in the back seat of the car, then being carried into the house and up to her bed while she would pretend to still be asleep, even though she had woken up as soon as her dad had opened the garage door, because she liked having her dad carry her, because she was getting too big for that by then and the only time he picked her up was when she was sleeping and she liked to hear his heartbeat against her ear when he carried her against his chest, and she would squeeze her eyes shut when they tucked her under the covers, and she’d feel her mom’s lipstick leave a trace on her forehead when she kissed Kie goodnight, and--

_Fuck._

She wants to down an entire bottle of vodka and forget this whole evening.

But she can’t, because she’s pregnant.

She wants to smoke until she can’t feel her face anymore.

But she _can’t_ , because she’s _pregnant._

Kie’s been trying really hard not to get bitter about the whole baby thing — after all, it was her choice to keep it. She could have fixed the problem and moved on with her life, but she didn’t. She chose to stick it out.

(And she knows why, but won’t admit it to anyone but herself: because it’s JJ’s baby. She wanted to keep it because the baby is JJ’s. And just like the fact that she wants him to kiss her again, that _means_ something, right?)

But at times like these, when all she wants to do is let off some steam through some technically-illegal activities, it’s hard not to resent the tiny bean of a human growing inside her belly.

In lieu of alcohol and weed, Kie drives down to the beach. It looks like the pouring rain might turn into a thunderstorm, and she doesn’t have a surfboard, but that doesn’t matter. She just needs to be in the water — to feel its calming coolness against her skin, keeping her grounded in a world that’s spinning and spinning and spinning in circles. And so she shoves the gear stick into park, steps out while the engine’s still running, and sprints down to the shoreline. 

She runs and runs and runs until she reaches the water, wades in up to her knees, feels the cold waves sloshing around her shins, and _screams._ As loud as she can. Into the ocean, into the wind, into the darkening sky. She screams for the life she lost the one moment she was careless when JJ had her pinned up against the weatherboards, mouth on her neck, hands on her waist: the travel, the adventure, the remnants of her adolescence. She screams for the life in her womb: knitting itself together with miraculous precision, cells forming organs and blood vessels and nerves, unplanned and unwanted (except that part’s not true, not even a little). And she tries not to feel bitter. She _really_ tries. 

Then her bottom lip is wobbling and her legs are aching from running, and she falls onto her knees in the ocean with a sob. That’s when the tears start falling.

Kiara _hates_ crying. Hates it so much. She hates even more that she’s cried so often during her pregnancy thus far — and whether that’s the hormones or the crushing weight of responsibility bearing down on her from all sides, she’s not sure. 

But right now, on her knees in the surf with waves licking at her shorts and splashing the sides of her shirt, she allows herself to feel the full spectrum of human emotion, and cries.

* * *

JJ is sitting on his couch drinking beer and listening to the sound of rain on the roof with his eyes closed (he had a long day at work, okay?), Fisher in his favourite spot lying across JJ’s feet and keeping them warm,  when he hears a knock at the door.

A frantic pounding, really. One that jars him awake and propels his body forward to stumble to the front door. 

He swings it open to find Kiara, looking a complete hot mess. 

Rain has drenched her hair and her clothes. Water is puddling at her shoes. There is sand pressed into the skin of her knees. Had she been at the beach? In just a pair of denim shorts and a t-shirt? In the middle of a _thunderstorm?_

“Kie?” he says, gaping at her. “Are you alright?"

She swallows hard, pushes a wad of matted hair over her shoulder, and asks, “Can I stay here tonight?” Fisher pads over to lick curiously at her dirty knees, and Kie bends down a little to pat the dog on his soft old head.

It’s only then that he notices the redness of her eyes and the wobble in her bottom lip. “Uh, yeah,” JJ says breathlessly, opening up the door wider to let her in. “Yeah, of course.” Once she’s safely inside and under the light of the hallway, he gives her a good look up and down. She’s shivering. “Are you okay?” he asks tentatively.

While she may look like she’s been crying, her voice is as strong as steel. “I told my parents,” she says, jaw set like stone. “About the baby.”

“Oh.” His heart starts beating double time. Shit. “ _Oh._ ”

“It did not go well.”

“Oh.”

“I went to the beach. Hence the rain. And the...sand,” she finishes lamely, gesturing to the grains that stick to the exposed, wet skin on her legs and arms.

“Oh,” he says again, like a fucking parrot. In his defence, what is he _supposed_ to say? 

Then she says: “They don’t want anything to do with me.”

And he says: “I’m sorry.” And thinks maybe this is a good time to hug her, because she looks like she’s about to burst into (what certainly couldn’t be her first of the night) a round of tears. So he does -- he steps forward and pulls her close into his chest, lets her rest her tired head on his shoulder, lets her soak the fabric of his shirt with her wet clothes. Fisher circles them, whining softly, seemingly understanding that something is wrong and trying to make it better by pressing his warm body against their legs. He almost calls the dog away, but decides against it -- the big old yellow mutt is a calming presence.

“I’m not,” Kie replies after a moment, voice muffled against his shirt. “If they don’t love me enough to support me in this, then fuck ‘em. I don’t need them anyway.”

He places his hands on her shoulders and gently nudges her away from his chest. When she finally looks at him again, he can tell that she’s trying to hold back tears. He thinks she should let them fall. He thinks he could handle it. “Kie—“ he starts, but she shakes her head, water droplets flying.

“I'm _serious,_ J,” Kie insists. “I don’t need them. I can do this without them. Besides,” she shrugs, “I’m not alone. I have you, right?”

Something lumpy and heavy and unmoveable sticks in his throat. “Yeah,” he replies. His voice cracks. Kie’s eyebrow quirks at it. He hurries on. “You wanna, uh, stay here tonight?”

Her wide brown eyes light up with something that looks like gratitude. “That would be nice. Thank you.”

JJ takes another step back from her and runs a hand through his hair, as is his nervous tic. “Cool,” he says, attempting to swallow down that lump. “You, uh, you need a shower or something?” He waves a hand vaguely in the direction of the bathroom. “You look freezing.”

She grins at that, dark eyes brightening even more. “I _am_ fucking freezing, actually,” she says, and JJ smiles back.

“Towels are in the hall cupboard,” he says, and then she’s nodding at him and brushing past him to make for the bathroom down the hall.

He goes back to his seat on the couch and twiddles his thumbs as he waits for her to finish, listening to her sing softly in the shower, and tries not to think about Kie naked. 

It’s hard, because he know what her body looks like, probably better than anyone else. He clenches his fists hard and digs the tips of his fingernails into his palms to stop him from thinking too hard about it. He tilts his head back against the couch cushions and squeezes his eyes shut, listening hard for the rain on the roof to drown out the sound of Kie singing Beyonce down the hall.

* * *

Fifteen minutes later, he hears Kie’s footsteps come back down the hall and into the living room. 

“How was the shower?” he asks, turning around to peer over at her, and _oh,_ she’s only wearing the bath towel he’d lent her, and nothing else.

Shit.

Well, this isn’t gonna be good for his totally-not-thinking-about-her-naked shtick. Because if he wasn’t before, he definitely is now. 

Can he be blamed for doing so, though? She turns from him to open the fridge door in search of a snack and he admires her quietly from afar: towel wrapped under her arms, tucked tight enough that the curve of her hips and her blossoming belly are apparent, long, curly hair dripping wet onto the kitchen floor, white cotton a contrast against the deep, silky bronze of her skin. 

Fisher is sitting next to JJ on the couch, droopy eyes half shut in drowsiness. With an apologetic grimace and a whispered  _ “Sorry, buddy,” _ JJ wakes the dog up and gently yet swiftly pushes him off the couch, making room for Kie if she chooses to sit next to him at some point. With a click of his fingers, JJ points down the hall towards the laundry, where Fisher’s dog bed sits. Fisher seems to understand what JJ’s trying to say: the dog blinks slowly at him then huffs as if to say  _ yeah, I get it, _ and ambles down the hall to find his bed for the night. 

“Night, Fisher,” Kie coos as the dog passes her in the kitchen, bending down to give him a pat before he continues on his journey. Then, she answers JJ’s previous question, saying, “It was good. Warm.” She rifles through the fridge cabinets. “What are you watching?”

He hadn’t even noticed that the television was still playing Netflix on silent. He’d put it on mute a while before Kie had arrived and forgotten to turn it off. “I was watching Avatar: the Last Airbender, but--” JJ spies her pulling out a jar of pickles from the fridge. “Pickles?” he asks incredulously, raising his eyebrows. “Really?”

Kie twists around to face him, fishing a pickle out of the jar and biting into it with a crunch and a cheeky grin. “I don’t ask questions, I just satisfy cravings. Baby wants pickles, I eat ‘em,” she says, patting her belly as she speaks.

He shakes his head and laughs. “You’re so weird.”

“You love it.” 

She puts the jar back in the fridge then makes her way over to the couch, casually sitting down in the space he’d made for her and swinging her legs over his. JJ startles for a moment, unsure where to put his hands -- too far to the left and he’ll be getting into dangerous territory, and then if she uncrosses her ankles just a little he might get an accidental peek of...wait. Fuck. _Is she wearing underwear?_ his brain screams. _What if she’s not wearing underwear?_ Ah, shit. He resigns himself to resting his hands, clenched again in fists, carefully on his lap, brushing against her crossed calves and tries extremely valiantly to keep his eyes on her face and nowhere else.

JJ’s not sure where all this bashfulness is coming from. He’s usually so chill around Kie. Even when it came to hooking up -- he was always confident, always sure of himself. It just feels...different now. In so many ways. 

_She came here,_ he reflects as he curiously watches her chomp down on her pickle and watch the rest of the Avatar episode on silent. _She came here. She’s staying here._

_I want her to stay here forever._

That last thought comes unprovoked into his mind and it frightens him a little. Because that _means_ something, right? That he wants her to stay. It means something big.

“Speaking of weird…” he starts. “I was thinking…should we, like, get married or something?”

And oh, God, as soon as the words are out of his mouth, as soon as he watches Kie pause mid-crunch and stare at him like he’s grown three heads, he knows that was the most embarrassing shit he’s ever said in his life. John B and Pope would be _killing_ themselves laughing right now.

“That’s good, JJ,” she chuckles. “Get all the dumb ideas out of your system.” Whatever pain and anger and frustration she must have been feeling when she arrived seems to have been flushed away down the drain of the Chateau’s shower. And hey, even though she’s making fun of him now, he’d rather that instead of her being upset.

He rolls with it, though. “Really? I think that it could actually be--”

“No!” she interrupts with a laugh. “JJ! We’re nineteen! Are you crazy?”

He raises his hand in defence. “Hey, it was just an idea! I thought you might want that. Or your parents might want that.”

“I don’t care what my parents want,” she says, a dark veil dropping over her eyes for a moment. “We’re not getting fucking married.”

“Well— do you want to be my girlfriend then?” JJ asks, knowing this is stupid too, but scrambling for something to say.

“Are you seriously asking me right now?” she laughs again, and he loves that he’s making her laugh while her eyes are still rimmed red with tears, even though she’s laughing at _him._ “After I just turned down your proposal of _marriage_?”

“It’s just another option!” he exclaims, enjoying the easy banter between them. He’s loved growing closer with her again over the past few weeks. Loves that the friendship between them runs so deep, goes back so far, that the back-and-forth they have between them will probably be there forever, no matter what happens. “Last time I asked, you told me to wait awhile! Well, it’s been awhile, so I thought it was appropriate!”

She swats him on the shoulder with her half-eaten pickle and he yelps. “You’re ridiculous.”

“Fine, fine,” he chuckles, letting his hands come down to rest on her shins now, fingers spreading across her warm skin. “No labels, then. I’ll just be your baby daddy forever.”

Kie rolls her eyes but doesn’t even try to bite back the smile that quirks at her lips. “Shut up, JJ.” After a long, pregnant (quite literally) pause as they both quietly watch the TV, she continues. “No, I’m serious,” she says, softer now. Genuine. “I don’t want you to feel some kind of like, _obligation_ towards me because I’m pregnant.” 

And, well, _that_ hurts. Is this really how she feels about him? That he doesn’t want the responsibility? That he doesn’t want to be with her just because she’s _Kiara_ , but because he knocked her up? His gaze flicks from the TV to study the side of her face as she stares straight ahead. He takes in the plumpness of her lips, the way they move around the consonants and vowels she speaks, the fine hairs curling from the hot shower around her forehead and her ears, the soft furrow of her brow, thinks _how could she ever think I wouldn’t want her?_

“I know you were fucking other girls before I — we — found out,” she continues, getting rambly now, as she does when she’s nervous, “so I don’t expect you to suddenly become monogamous because—”

“Kie.”

“What?”

“Shut the fuck up.”

She whips around to face him, lips curling in confusion. “What? I’m trying to—”

“I never slept with any of them,” he admits. “I couldn’t. Trust me.”

For a long moment, Kie is silent, her dark eyes just searching his face for some kind of answer to a question she seems to be too scared to ask. Instead, her face settles into a smirk that doesn’t reach the crinkles at the corners of her eyes, and she jokes, with a wavering voice, “What? Erectile dysfunction? At your age?”

JJ shakes his head and looks down at his hands, focusing intently on the freckles on his knuckles. He doesn’t laugh back. The atmosphere has changed. “Nah. You fucked me up, Kie,” he says, voice close to a rasped whisper. “That first time. You were just— you were in my head, always. I couldn’t get you out.”

“One good fuck and you’re a goner, huh? That’s weak.” She’s still obviously trying to play this off as a joke. He knows it’s just a defensive mechanism -- he knows, because he uses something similar every single fucking day of his life. 

How can he get her to understand that he’s not kidding anymore? That he’s done playing around? “Don’t pretend like you don’t feel the same way,” he says, hoping that he’s right in saying so.

It turns out, he is. Kie stills beside him. He can practically _hear_ her heart beating. Then, she whispers, “I never said I was pretending.”

 _Oh._ “Kiara, I—“ 

“You don’t have to—“

“No, you know what?” JJ says with finality. “I want to talk about this. We _need_ to talk about this.” He looks over at her and sighs, tilting his head to the side, resting his cheek against the back of the couch cushions. “I’m done with the bullshit, Kie,” he says gingerly. “I don’t want to lie about how I feel anymore — about _anything_ . I know you don’t want to talk about this because you’re scared about how things will change between us, but _fuck_ , Kie, they changed the first time you kissed me, alright? I’m fucking terrified too but I’m not gonna stay silent anymore because I— I— _fuck—_ ” His heart is beating out of his fucking chest right now, but he pushes on, because if he doesn’t allow himself to be vulnerable, like his therapist said, and say what he’s really feeling right now, while Kie is looking at him like she understands him, then he’ll never have the balls to say it at all. “When I look at you, I feel like I can do anything. I’ve never felt that way before.”

And that’s the whole truth.

He sighs again, and it’s like all the pent-up emotions he’s been feeling over the past year are spilling out in one long breath. 

Then, like a miracle, Kie’s saying with a tone that’s hushed, secretive, heartbreakingly honest, “I’m glad it’s you, JJ.”

 _Oh._ Oh. Okay. 

He swallows hard and wets his lips. Her eyes dart down to his mouth as he does so, then back up to meet his gaze. His hands tighten on her calves. She doesn’t flinch.

_Shit._

He’s _gotta_ say something to break the tension or he might literally explode. “You don’t wanna get changed? I have some spare clothes you can--”

“No,” she says. Just that one word. _No._

And then she’s climbing into his lap, the damp towel she wears hitching up around the top of her thighs, and he’s trying so fucking hard these days to be a gentleman so he doesn’t try to push his hands up further than from where they go immediately to sit on the small of her back. 

Time slows. Nothing feels quite real. Kie’s bare thighs are pressed against his legs and he can feel the heat of her skin through his sweatpants, and she’s looking at him with eyes that are almost black, and the air suddenly feels very, very heavy, and _fuck_ , yep, she’s definitely not wearing underwear, _oh my God_ \--

Then Kie makes the move he’s too fucking scared to and plunges forward to press her lips to his.

Kissing Kie is like tasting sunlight: impossibly warm and golden and soft. His mouth opens to hers quickly, easily, hungrily, because it’s been so long since they’ve kissed like this and it feels better than it ever has before. One of her hands goes up to slide across his cheek and cup under his left ear, her thumb caressing his cheekbone, sending sparks right through his skin with her lightning-filled fingers.

His hands move to settle heavy on her hips and he pulls her towards him until her belly is touching his chest, confidence in being this close to her restored as he subconsciously remembers that yes, he’s good at this, he’s good at kissing and making girls feel good -- especially Kie. He knows this because she sighs audibly into his mouth when he grips her hips tighter and nips at the soft skin behind her ear. He knows this because she pushes against him in a hurried movement that suggests that she wants more, more, _more._

And, _fuck_ , it’s been months but his body still responds to her soft touch the same way it had in the beginning. JJ’s practically on _fire_ , his skin burning everywhere her fingers touch, all the blood in him rushing from his head down to his lap, stars dancing behind the dark of his closed eyelids.

It’s not hard to escalate things between them without even really thinking about it.

All he has to do is to lightly tug at the edge of her towel and it unravels into a puddle around her hips, baring her body to him. His heart leaps at the sight of her — the heavy swell of her breasts, the tight expanse of her growing belly smooth except for the little tiger stripes along the edge of her hips, golden skin glowing. Her body already looks so different to the last time he saw her like this, but he’s not complaining. 

_Fuck, I love pregnancy,_ he thinks as he runs the palms of his hands over her back, pulling her forward even further, her hips rolling against his. She reaches down to pull his shirt off by the hemline then leans into him until it feels like every part of her skin is touching his. 

“Are you sure?” he asks as a precaution, even as she presses a kiss to his bare collarbone. 

“Yes,” she hums into his skin.

He swallows hard and continues, “I just know you’re upset and I don’t want to—”

“J,” she sighs, leaning back to cup his face with her hands and look into his eyes. He finds them to be filled equally with warmth and desire and something else he can’t quite give a name to, but understands. “I’ve been thinking about doing this for _weeks_ . _Please.”_

Something dark and delicious curls in his stomach, and he presses forward to kiss her again, and to slip his hand under the towel that pools at her waist, and he thinks he’s probably never been happier than when he’s touching Kie, holding Kie, kissing Kie. 

For some reason, the intimacy of this moment surpasses everything else that has come before. In letting him touch her, staring right into his eyes with pupils black as night, dark waves of hair cascading over her shoulders that make her look like some kind of otherworldly goddess, he gets the sense that she is baring her entire _soul_ to him. Handing it to him and asking him to take care of it.

He wants to say _I’ll be careful, I promise, I will._ He wants to say _I’ll do anything for you, especially when you look at me like this._ He almost says _you’re so fucking beautiful, you know that?_ but Kie is swallowing his words with her kisses and he’s not sure that he ever wants to come up for air. 

JJ likes being ‘just friends’, sure. And if he only ever got to be ‘just friends’ with Kiara for the rest of his life, that would be totally fine.

But he can’t deny that he _did_ miss this part.

“JJ, I need—” she presses her nose to the crook of his neck and hums as he moves against her. She smells like saltwater and autumn rain and sweat and his head might explode if she keeps making the sounds that she is right now.

“What?” he whispers into her hair. “What do you need?” _I’ll give you anything. I’ll give you everything I’ve got. My heart, my soul, my fucking life. What do you need?_

“You,” is the answer, punctuated by a sigh. “Now.” _Always,_ is the unspoken addendum. 

Soon, all remaining items of clothing are tossed aside. When she sinks down onto him, his breath hitches in his throat. She’s so warm — everywhere, all around him, all at once. Sharp light flickers behind his eyes as they move together, so fluid, so smooth, like they’re dancing on this couch, his hands clutching at her hips, her hands fisted in his hair.

(He’d thought about getting it cut after summer ended. He’s now glad that he kept it long.)

There’s fire in her kiss, white-hot and scalding, burning marks into his skin everywhere her lips touch. Things between them become a blur. There are moments of clarity that override the sound of blood rushing in his ears, like the press of her lips to the pulse point in his neck or the hush of her breath against his cheek, or the sound she makes when she laughs as he tries to carry her off to bed and just about drops her in the hallway.

He almost spoils it for himself, though. _Almost._ When her eyes are rolling back in her head and he feels like his mind has split from his body he says, without really thinking, just feeling, “Fuck, you’re so beautiful, Kie— I lov—“

“Don’t say it,” she says between huffs of breath, cutting him off. “Don’t— don’t say it if you don’t mean it.”

 _I do mean it,_ he wants to say, but swallows the words and kisses her, open-mouthed and dirty, instead, because he thinks this is more about her being scared of what those words might _mean_ , rather than the sincerity of them. 

When she finally comes apart it’s in his arms, and when it’s his turn and everything dissolves into buzzing white noise, he remembers John B saying something about _making love_ and thinks, _yeah, this is probably it._

* * *

After, when she is lying against his chest in his bed with the covers pulled up to her chin and he is lightly stroking his fingertips along the inside of her arm, he asks, with a cheeky smile, “You still turning down my offer of marriage?”

Kie sits up on her forearms to scrunch her cute little nose at him, playfulness sparkling in her brown eyes. “Yes, JJ. Obviously.”

“Obviously? I would have thought you’d want to lock me down forever after that,” he teases, knowing he’s being a dickhead but not caring in the slightest, because his silly comment makes her roll her eyes and smile.

“You’re an idiot.”

He reaches up to tickle her bare sides and she falls against him with a twisted yelp. He laughs. “You love it.”

Kie hums her agreement then settles herself back onto his chest. He lifts a hand to thread his fingers through her curls, carefully tugging on knots when he encounters them. He does this for a long time, until he’s almost falling asleep. 

Then she is waking him up by saying, “I’ve booked an ultrasound,” surprising him, as she always does. “The twenty week scan. We could find out the sex of the baby, if we wanted. Do you want that?”

JJ can’t see her face right now but he can feel the tension in her muscles as he holds her. “I don’t know,” he tentatively replies. “Do you?”

“I think—” she pushes herself up to straddle him. A lock of hair falls into her eyes and she blows it out of the way, only to have it flop back down. It’s cute. _She’s_ cute. “I kinda wanna keep it a surprise,” she says softly but seriously, reaching out to brush her fingers through his hair. His hands rest comfortably on her hips. “I don’t want any of that gender-reveal-party bullshit. I’m not about to put labels on my kid before it’s even born. If it comes out with boy parts, cool. Girl parts, equally as cool. I don’t need to know beforehand.”

“I like that,” he says, leaning upwards to kiss her quickly, tenderly. “Let’s keep it a secret, then.”

He pulls her back down to embrace him, and the way she fits so perfectly in his arms makes his heart twist into shapes it never has before — beautiful, new shapes, yet painful in their own way, like they’re breaking off old scar tissue and bearing fresh pink skin to cool air. They never used to cuddle after sex when they did this before. This is an entirely new thing. An entirely _good_ new thing. 

He honestly doesn’t think he’s ever felt this way about any other human being in his life. He wonders if all the love he has inside him will be enough for Kiara _and_ the baby, then chastises himself for being ridiculous. Words remembered from his phone conversation with Kiara that week she was in Wilmington, echoed by their therapist, play over and over again in his mind: _you are allowed to have this. You are allowed to feel like this and to want this. You are going to be a good father_.

The cotton of his sweatpants is soft against his skin and Kie’s sweet-smelling hair tickles his nose. One hand is splayed across her bare belly, the other tucked under his chin. 

For the first time in a long time, he feels utterly, completely at rest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> god they're both IDIOTS but at least they both know they like each other now.....damn babes only took you guys ten chapters and a baby jeez louise. all this talk of "maybe it MEANS something" yeah no SHIT idiots you'r ein LOVE
> 
> i definitely edited that last scene about 50 times over bc intimate scenes make me Cringe if they’re not relatively well-written so i hope it wasn’t too bad hahaha
> 
> continued BIG thanks to all the kudos-ers, commenters, anon-askers-who-give-me-great-ideas-for-future-scenes, and silent readers - i love you ALL! and thank you as always to my beta shannon for reading this over for me !!
> 
> p.s. sorry my update schedule has been so fcked recently! i think i'll say that i'll aim to have a chapter pushed out every 2 weeks so no one gets sad when it's not weekly....and then if one pops up earlier than that, BONUS!


	12. days of our lives

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> some may call this a "filler chapter" or "something that shows the passage of time"........i call it "JJ and Kie's Autumn Pregnancy Adventures"

After that night, Kie never really leaves. 

Kie sends in her two-week notice to the Wreck, detailing her reasons for quitting in a very formal email to her dad. When JJ expresses his concern at her cutting all ties to her family (even though he knows that need better than anyone), she argues that she’s still got the leftover money from the gold sitting in her savings, which they can use until she can go back to work after the baby, and that she definitely can’t handle seeing her father at work every single day, which JJ understands.

(When she goes out to walk the dog and catch some air in the late afternoons and leaves her phone at home to _be present in nature_ , he quickly learns to let all phone calls from ‘Dad’ go to voicemail.)

And so Kie stays with him in the Chateau, and the house becomes their home.

The sheets in JJ’s bed (it’s firmly his, now — John B has been gone long enough) begin to smell like her organic-vegan-strawberry-flavoured body wash. Wildflowers start appearing in hastily-gathered bunches on the kitchen counter, remnants of Kie’s walks with Fisher. She’s too stubborn (or scared) to go back home to collect her clothes, so she repurposes his old t-shirts and shorts into clothes that fit her growing body (because it’s not like she could fit into any of her old crop tops anyway). 

Everything in the old fish shack begins to smell like Kie, look like Kie, feel like Kie. When he wakes up in the morning with his nose pressed into her hair, when he gets home from the garage to find she’s already got a chilled can of beer out for him to drink, when he falls asleep at night with his arms around her waist — it’s all just _Kiara_.

She had stayed over at the Chateau plenty of times before that night, of course, but it was so different. Before, he’d been side-stepping around his feelings for her, never sure if she reciprocated, trying to be content with just being her friend. 

And now?

Now, her laughter echoes down the hallways and fills the cracks in the walls where there used to be nothing but dust. And she smiles into his mouth every time he kisses her. And even when she’s telling him off for doing something dumb, like forgetting to bring in the laundry before it rains or leaving the fridge door open, there’s always a glint in her eyes that says something otherwise.

And while there’s no labels just yet, he knows that he is Kie’s as much as she is his. 

Maybe that’s all they need.

* * *

The end of September brings a visit to the clinic for the twenty-week ultrasound. 

Kiara is less nervous this time around now that she knows what to expect.

She doesn’t expect, however, the lump that lodges itself in her throat when she looks at the screen and spies a head, a nose, a hand, two legs, a heartbeat.

The baby inside her is no longer a smudge. It’s a tiny little person.

 _Can we do this? For real?_ Kie thinks as she watches that screen. It’s an anxious thought that has been bouncing around her head since the day she found out she was pregnant, and it seems that time has not been kind to her nerves. As the baby grows and the day she truly becomes a mother approaches closer, Kie worries again if she’ll be up to the job. If _they’ll_ be up to it. What happens if they don’t stay together? She doesn’t want to be a single mom, but it’s a big thing to ask of JJ — to stay, even if they’re not in love. 

(She suspects more and more these days that this statement may no longer be true.)

And so, with this nervous cocktail of fear and apprehension churning inside her, she looks to JJ, who grounds her like nothing else really does, like the feeling of waves lapping at her calves and feet dug into sand. 

JJ is still beside her, watching carefully as the ultrasound technician — the same kind woman as last time they were here — talks them through the different things they can see on the screen. And Kie takes _special_ notice of the fact that he is completely still and silent, because JJ Maybank never is. He’s always a force of sound and energy, flying around every room he’s in like he’s a toy that will never run out of battery. 

She turns her head from her position laying on the vinyl-covered bed to take a proper look at him, and finds his blue eyes wide, gaze focused on the moving picture in front of them. The expression of child-like wonder and joy he wears threatens to break her heart in all the best ways possible.

Kie lightly squeezes JJ’s hand, the one wrapped tightly around hers. “Hey,” she whispers, just loud enough for him to hear but not so her voice interrupts the sonographer’s speech on expected fetal growth in the third trimester. “You okay?”

JJ glances down at her and offers up a shaky kind of smile that tells her he’s just as overwhelmed with this whole thing as she is. “Never been better, baby,” he says with a cheeky raise of an eyebrow, and it’s meant to be a joke, but it’s the first time he’s ever called her that. She has to bite her lip hard to keep from smiling back.

Pet names and other such nicknames shouldn’t be important to her, because they’re stupid and meaningless and besides, she already has a nickname: ‘Kie’ is _more_ than enough, thank you.

But there’s something about the way JJ calls her _baby_ so casually, and how it sounds so normal rolling off his tongue, that makes her rethink her position on the topic.

She thinks she could probably get used to being someone’s _baby._

This time, as they’re walking out to the car after the conclusion of the appointment, it’s _JJ_ who kisses Kie by the car, gently pushing her up against the driver’s side door, one hand caressing her cheek, one hand on her bump. 

Safe. Solid. Warm.

* * *

The growth of her belly creeps up on him. They’re together so much he doesn’t even notice the slow, gradual swell of it.

The first time he really does is soon after they have the twenty week ultrasound. 

Kie’s getting undressed, ready for a shower, when the late afternoon light catches the curve of her belly, and he is transfixed. Mouth open, eyebrows raised, jaw slack — real, creepy-dude levels of staring, here.

“J,” she says with a laugh as she turns around, naked, to find him ogling her. “Stop it.”

“You’re beautiful,” JJ replies, in the sappiest tone that would make even John B, King of the Sooks, squirm. 

She responds by stepping closer to him, to where he sits on the edge of their bed, pressing a kiss to his nose and whispering, “You wanna shower with me?”

And it’s physically impossible for him to say no to that, isn’t it?

He kisses her bare belly while they’re in the shower and labels it “baby peach” to Kie’s amusement. She pretends like she thinks it’s stupid, but JJ knows her well enough to know she secretly likes that he’s been taking the time to research the development of their baby — even if it’s in fruit sizes.

Tracking the baby’s size through fruit becomes his thing after that. First it’s a peach, then an avocado, then a sweet potato, a small head of lettuce, a butternut squash. 

They name the baby _Gremlin_ because it’s a little bastard that loves to kick around and keep Kie up at night. JJ’s a light sleeper, which means he’s often woken up by Kie groaning in pain and frustration at the little acrobat moving inside her.

The first time this happened — also the first time he ever felt the baby kick — was at two in the morning one Tuesday in October. 

He was dreaming about getting barreled in thunderstorm seas when he awoke to Kie poking him in the shoulder and whispering hurriedly, “ _JJ! Wake up! It’s kicking!”_

JJ, groggy and only one-quarter awake, mumbled, “ _Wah—?”_

Kie responded by wordlessly grabbing his hand and placing it on her bare stomach. It was then that he felt a tiny little foot pressing against his palm, wriggling around and kicking at his hand. 

“Kie—” he breathed, unable to form any other words but her name. 

Kie had grunted in discomfort as the baby shifted again, now digging into the space under her belly button. His hand followed the movement. 

“She’s been doing this all night,” Kie whispered, the whites of her eyes bright in the dark. “I just didn’t want to wake you up.”

“She?” he had grinned.

“Just a feeling I have,” she’d smiled back. He was sure that if the lights were on, he would have seen her blushing.

Heart full to burst, JJ had shuffled down further into the blankets and placed a gentle kiss on the part of Kie’s belly where the baby was kicking. “You need to let mama sleep, lil’ Gremlin. Be nice. She deserves it.” And the name had stuck. No longer a smudge, but a Gremlin. It’s stupid, but it’s fun, and JJ fuckin’ _loves_ nicknames.

Kie had sifted her fingers through his hair, nails scratching comfortingly against his scalp, while he had lain there with his cheek pressed against her belly and his arms around her waist. They’d fallen asleep like that, wrapped up in each other, unaware and uncaring of anything else in the world but each other.

Kie and the unborn baby inside her have made him soft. JJ sometimes wonders about what happened to the carefree kid he used to be, careening around the Banks on his motorbike, getting high and macking on as many hot girls as he could at parties down at the Boneyard. He never used to be so cautious, so thoughtful, so measured. He thinks it’s equal parts growing up, Pope rubbing off on him, and a subconscious change in his personality as he prepares to become a father.

(That’s not to say that, deep down, he’s the same little shit as he always has been. Kie’s threatened to kick him out of the house for being _so fucking annoying_ more times than he can count. But hey, he’s gotta keep it spicy, ya know? Can’t be becoming _too_ boring.)

He does worry about it sometimes, though: that he’s growing up too fast. That he might become someone he doesn’t want to be. What if this is _it_ for him? What if he’s settling too young? What if he’ll be working in the same minimum wage job, living on the same street, drinking the same beer for the rest of his life? And it’s got nothing to do with Kie — because she’s perfect, and although he’s never really seen marriage in a positive light (although they must have loved each other at _some_ point, his parents’ marriage was not exactly something to aspire to), and he’s also way too fucking young to be thinking about proposing and settling down in that way, if she ever wanted to do the whole white-dress-pretty-church thing, he wouldn’t say no. 

It’s just a little more complicated than that, isn’t it? 

He worries about Kie, especially. 

JJ never, _ever_ , wants her to feel that the only reason they’re together is because of the baby, or that she’s bound to him forever because they made one stupid mistake. 

He knows that Kie’s a free spirit at heart. Always has been. If it weren’t for that one emotionally charged afternoon where they both experienced a lack of connection between their brain cells, Kie would be hiking through the Thai jungle right now. He knows she’s always wanted to travel — to meet new people, have new experiences, get out of the Outer Banks for once in her life. 

Getting knocked up by a Maybank kind of guarantees that you’ll be stuck in the OBX forever. And not because JJ particularly _wants_ to stay here, but because that’s a thing Maybanks do. Sticking around the Cut is something his father did, his grandfather did, probably his great-grandfather too. It’s almost like a curse. Like no matter how hard JJ wishes he could go anywhere else, how hard he works, he’ll always be stuck here, toes dug deep into the mud of the estuary, pockets filled with dirt weighing him down.

He’s dirt. He gets that. It doesn’t matter what his therapist says: he knows he’s dirt, plain and simple. It’s his bloodline. It’s the Maybank dynasty. It is what it is.

But Kie is the furthest thing from dirty. She comes from a good family — a good home, with money and comforts he can’t provide, parents who love each other and who love their kid. She can kiss him and touch him and tell him she cares about him all she wants, but it feels like there will always be a little part of him that screams _diamonds don’t stay in the dirt._

He wants to tell her that he’ll take her travelling. They’ll go anywhere she wants to go. Fuck it, he’ll stay home in the OBX and look after the baby while Kie goes and does whatever she wants. He wants her to be free. He wants her to be with him, too, but if staying with him long-term means leaving in the short term, he’d be okay with that.

It feels too soon to promise her these kind of things, though. Maybe it’s better to focus on the here-and-now instead of the future. On her warm hands kneading the knots out of his shoulders after a long day at work, of the baby kicking against his palm, of making and cooking orange chicken and eating it on the sofa while listening to the rain pour down outside.

* * *

JJ will do anything to help Kie or to make life comfortable for her.

Which she appreciates, don’t get her wrong.

But it’s hard sometimes to accept that help and not see it as an affront to her independence. 

Some help is good: massaging her feet when they start to get swollen; helping her wash a dirty Fisher after she’d taken him down to the beach for a walk and he got a little too excited splashing around in the water; making her pickles with peanut butter and a myriad of other weird snacks that Gremlin inexplicably wants and not complaining about the weirdness of them; braiding her hair for her; cooking her breakfast before he goes to work because she’s too tired to do it herself.

Other help is...more annoying. Case in point: the day her car breaks down, and JJ doesn’t trust her to fix it on her own.

It turns out the alternator is broken, which is why the car wouldn’t start that morning when she went to go pick up some dog food for Fisher. JJ, after claiming loudly that as the mechanic in the family he would fix it real quick, grabs his work tools from his truck and gets to work.

JJ already has the scraped-up hood (she’d been determined to buy her first car with her _own_ money, even if she only had enough for a shitty old sedan) popped up by the time she waddles outside, barefoot on the gravel even though it’s barely fifty degrees. 

Before she can even open her mouth to offer some help, JJ says, without turning around, “Go back inside, Kie. I’m all good here.”

Kie knows he’s not saying it to be rude, but it still rubs her the wrong way. She stops in her tracks, crossing her arms defensively over her chest. Her forearms rest on the top of her belly; she’s really popped out the past couple weeks. “Yeah, but I _want_ to help you,” is her insistent reply.

This time, he turns around. One hand, clutching a wrench, rests on the car, while the other runs roughly through his unruly hair. She glares. He sighs. “It’s alright, really,” JJ says. “I don’t want you to push yourself too hard.”

Kie rolls her eyes. Hard. Like, attempting to see behind her head, hard. “I’m pregnant, JJ. Not useless,” she sighs long-sufferingly. They’ve had similar conversations too many times. She’s sick of being treated like she’s too fragile to do simple tasks. “Let me help.”

JJ turns to face her fully, crossing his arms over his old Kildare County High School sweater-clad chest, leaning against the car with a sly kind of smirk on his face that makes him look _very_ fucking attractive. Too bad she can’t enjoy the view because he’s pissing her off so much. (And yes, pregnancy hormones are definitely a thing and it’s felt like she’s been PMSing for around two weeks now because _everything_ makes her mad, but still, he’s being insufferable.) “Yeah, but I’m the mechanic here,” he presses. “I can—”

“And I’ve been working on cars with my dad since I was little,” she says with only a _little_ bit of selfish pride. “I know my way around a Ford.”

She’s about to storm over to the car, push him out of the way, and demand that she fix it herself. But then she thinks that this is probably JJ’s way of proving that he can help her around the house, and that she no longer has to worry about anything because he’ll take care of it. If he needs this misogynistic bullshit moment to feel like a grown man, then fine. She’ll give it to him.

With a compromise.

Although he says he’d still rather she stay inside where it’s warm, he agrees to let her help him. Only with handling the tools, though. She’s not allowed to bend down too low or to get her hands into places where they might get stuck. Thankfully, together they figure out pretty quick that the alternator doesn’t need replacing, just some simple repairs. Kie hands him the tools he needs and holds the flashlight for him (it’s after five now and getting dark). And also gets to stare at him while he works with his cute concentration face on, grease on his cheek, eyebrows furrowed. (It’s the little things.)

If she goes inside after half an hour of “helping” to rest her feet and make them some peppermint tea, then that’s no one’s business but her own. And JJ’s, with his stupid, all-knowing, self-satisfied grin.

Yeah, he’s annoying. She kinda loves him for it, though.

* * *

JJ Maybank is falling in love with Kiara Carrera day, by day, by day. 

(Keyword: _falling._ Not _in love_ just yet, thank you very much, Pope. He thinks he’ll know it when he really is in love with her, and he’s pretty sure that moment hasn’t happened yet. But it’s coming. Oh, for sure, it’s coming.)

It’s the little things, you know? The way his heart skips a fucking beat when he wakes up on a Saturday morning and that slow late-October sun shines through the blinds and settles across her sleeping face, and he’s reminded that _fuck_ , Kiara is one beautiful girl, and he should count his lucky stars that he ever grew enough balls to kiss her back that one evening last November. Or the way he can’t think of anything, _anyone_ , but her while he’s tinkering around with cars at work, and he lives every day just waiting for the moment he can clock out and drive home and see those pretty brown eyes. And _god_ damn it, watching the baby grow inside her and her body change to accommodate it is something _else._ She does maternity, like she does everything else, with such grace it leaves him speechless.

And it’s her singing along to the Wailers in the kitchen while she bakes bread on a Sunday, and the happy laughter from the bathroom that filters down the hall on Fisher’s bath-days, and it’s how she ironically (but also lowkey unironically) learnt the ‘Savage’ TikTok dance one rainy afternoon then showed it to him, and how they ended up in the bedroom after that one because _damn_ she can roll her hips just the right way that makes him crazy. It’s all of these things and more.

JJ feels like he finally has a family. All of his own. 

(He can’t wait to be a dad.)

Things between them are most definitely _not_ perfect, though. They fight sometimes, too.

After being best friends — and _just_ friends — for so many years, adjusting their relationship to fit this new I-like-you-romantically-and-we-live-together-and-we’re-also-probably-definitely-in-love-but-refuse-to-talk-about-it thing is _not_ easy.

It’s just...well...they solve most of their problems (all _minor_ disagreements, really) with sex. 

Which is incredible. Fucking _insane,_ actually.

Although it might not always be the healthiest thing in the world to cut disagreements short by getting naked, it’s working for them so far, and JJ has no plans to stop.

He had read once that pregnancy hormones either made women have no libido at all, or a sex drive that was running through the roof. It’s a honest-to-God blessing that Kie falls into the latter category. JJ does _not_ mind waking up in the early hours of the morning to Kie’s murmured propositions and kisses — plus, it’s like he’s getting his body clock ready for when the baby comes, because he’s _also_ read that new parents get like, two hours sleep a night, tops. 

There are a lot of things that are scary about becoming a parent. JJ worries a lot about how he’s supposed to hold the baby once it’s born, what to do if it gets sick or won’t breastfeed — and what about when it’s a teenager and decides it wants to take after it’s mom and dad in their adolescent years and smoke a ton of weed before they’re old enough? 

His worries are calmed when he talks about these fears with Kie — who, surprisingly, has very similar worries to his. 

It’s nice to know he’s not alone.

* * *

Sarah throws a Halloween party for all her college friends at her and John B’s apartment in Charleston. Of course, JJ and Kie are invited. (Pope, too, even though he makes a huge fuss at having to dress up.) It’s a full day’s drive to Charleston from the Banks, so Kie and JJ decide to make a weekend out of the trip and accept Sarah’s offer for the two of them to stay over after the party. 

Even though it’s an uber-consumerist holiday in which major stores like Walmart just wanna make a quick buck off of cheap pumpkin-themed decorations and Ghostface masks, Kie secretly loves Halloween. 

And she sure won’t pass up the opportunity to come up with a tongue-in-cheek couples costume that works with her baby bump. (Because, yes: this is who she is now. A basic bitch.)

Kie manages to piece together two outfits for the party: she will be a cow, udders over her belly included, and JJ will be the farmer. Unoriginal? Maybe. Hilarious? Yes. Kie’s not often one to make fun of herself, but she figures Halloween is the one holiday where it’s safe to do so. Plus, JJ looks fucking _glorious_ in denim overalls.

She’s rewarded with a chorus of excited whoops and hollers when she and JJ enter the party, which makes all the hours spent painstakingly hand-sewing the ‘udders’ to her black-and-white bodysuit worth it. 

The party, for all intents and purposes, is fun, even without being able to drink alcohol. She spends half the time lounging on the couch with Sarah (who is dressed, completely unironically, as a sexy cat — Kie loves the girl, but she really, _truly_ is a basic bitch) chatting shit about the boys, and the other half absolutely creaming Pope and his new girlfriend Sofie at beer pong. She’s not allowed to drink, of course, so gets JJ to chug all the shots when she loses a cup, which ends up with her having one very drunk boy hanging off her arm and pressing sloppy kisses to her cheeks all night. 

And yes, Pope has a girlfriend. Who is much less awkward than him and very, _very_ pretty. Kie was as surprised as anyone else.

It’s around two am when Kie finally crawls under the covers of the pullout couch bed, after all the other revelers have departed and it’s just the four of them left (Pope and his girlfriend were making a weekend out of the trip too, but had opted to stay at an Airbnb closer to town). Sarah climbs in next to her to whisper in the dark and braid each other’s hair while John B and JJ play a round of cards on the kitchen table.

It feels just like old times: Sarah’s fingers in her hair, carefully twisting strands into long braids, breath warm against Kie’s neck as she chatters quietly about her favourite paper of the semester (History of Feminist Literature). It feels just like old times and Kie’s throat is thick with emotion the whole half hour Sarah lays next to her.

“I miss being just down the road from you,” Sarah says as she gives Kie a long hug before clambering out of bed and leaving room for a tired JJ. 

“I miss that too,” Kie replies with a soft smile, looking up at her best friend’s face, whose whites of her eyes and her teeth are still visible in the darkness.

And she does. Kie’s heart aches for the friends who are such an integral part of her life, but who don’t live with her anymore. And now the only time she gets to see them is on holidays or during the summer, but she worries that soon they’ll be so preoccupied with their own lives in their own new towns (not even new anymore, really — it’s been over a year since they all went away to college or to new jobs, like John B) that they’ll stop coming home. How will they know each other as deep as they used to if they’re not spending every second of those hot July days with each other? How will they know the intricacies of each other’s hearts if they’re not sharing their everyday lives? 

Like, she didn’t even know Pope was seeing someone. Which shouldn’t be a big deal, because Pope is a private kind of guy anyway, but it _feels_ important. It feels like something she should have known.

When she whispers her concerns to JJ in the quiet of the empty living room, he tucks her head under his chin and says, “He probably didn’t want to bother you about it, with the baby and everything.”

JJ calms her, like he always does, with calloused fingers trailing patterns down her spine.

She’s pretty sure she hears him whisper _love you, baby_ into her hair when he thinks she’s fallen asleep. She might say it back, silently, her mouth shaping the words but never letting them spill off her tongue.

She falls into a fitful sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i promised fluff for this one but it ran away from me and got a little angsty at parts.....soweee. (whenever i write sarah & kie it gets angsty......also something about the pogues all growing up and growing apart a little bit is so sad even though it's realistic and natural for high school friendships to do that???? ugh i'm sad)
> 
> thank you once again to every commenter, kudos-er, tumblr message-r, and silent reader. i love you ALL. you guys are my muse. and a thousand thank-yous to my beta reader, shannon!! you a real one
> 
> (also it's gonna get super angsty the next couple chaps so watch out for that mwahaha.....but also......only 5 chapters and an epilogue to go!!! waahhhh!!!)


	13. what is home, anymore?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have spent quite literally a MONTH trying to finish this chapter but it became such a fckin monster that i decided to split it up into 4 parts....here is the first of them - a bitta kie angst to tide you over until the big one (which is next). 
> 
> thank you to all of you who have been sending me lovely messages saying how much you've enjoyed re-reading spinning in circles while you wait for an update - i love rereading fics and it makes me GRIN like crazy when people say they've been rereading mine....actual fic writer goalz. i'm sorry this update is so much later than all the others too - work has been kicking my ass lately and i haven't been having time to sleep properly let alone writeeee...but things are toning down again so i should have more time to pump the next few chapters out in quick succession (fingers crossed).
> 
> anyway you didn't come here for a long ass author's note did you?? nope. onto the words. love you all.
> 
> p.s. songs for this chapter: ‘someone new’ by helena deland, ‘still trying’ by nathaniel rateliff

Kiara receiving calls from her parents regularly is not a new thing. She just lets them go to voicemail every time, figuring if they really wanted to talk with her and try to mend their relationship, they’d speak to her in person.

Fuck a phone call. Also fuck going to them first _. _ She’d asked for their support and they hadn’t given it. There’s no fucking way Kie is going to go crawling back to them asking for their help.

It doesn’t matter that she feels an ache within her chest whenever she thinks about the fact that this is the most significant thing that’s ever happened to her and her parents aren’t around to walk her through it. She is not going back to that house.

It turns out, though, that she doesn’t have to go back home to talk to her parents.

_ They  _ come to  _ her _ .

* * *

Kiara has just returned home from a mid-morning walk with Fisher, which hadn’t lasted as long as she’d wanted because she’s getting out of breath way too easy these days. It’s not fair, because she loves being active, but since putting on like, twenty pounds because of the baby, she can’t exactly go for long walks on the beach anymore.

Can’t walk. Can’t surf. Can’t smoke. Can’t drink alcohol. 

Can still fuck, though, which is a blessing. 

JJ’s much more careful with her now than he used to be — even compared to a month or two ago. She’s popped out so much since hitting thirty weeks that it makes things that used to be simple (like kneeling down on the hard wooden floor, or straddling his hips and getting on top) way too fucking difficult. Sex with JJ is slower, softer now, which doesn’t mean it isn’t just as nice. It’s different, but still good.

Kie smiles as she steps inside the house after filling up Fisher’s water bowl outside the front door, because thinking about JJ Maybank does that to her. He makes her so goddamn soft. She kind of loves it.

She finds a scrap of paper stuck to the fridge door, right next to the print-out of Gremlin from their twenty-week scan, when she heads into the kitchen to make herself a late breakfast. It’s written in JJ’s messy scrawl, misspelled words crossed out and rewritten in pencil. She hadn’t noticed it earlier this morning — but then again, she’d only gotten out of bed when it was time for Fisher’s walk at ten thirty, and JJ had left for work many hours earlier than that.

It reads: _hey pretty mama. today is friday which means I cook you dinner and we watch a movie. tonight will be_ _kesa_ _queso_ _quesadiya_ _whatever that stuff is with the wrap and the meat inside and the cheese. idk about the movie yet. you’ve got the whole day to choose. also you snore really loud and I thought about recording you this morning but you would probably beat the shit out of me. see you tonight x_

At the bottom of the page is a scribbled picture of Fisher, sitting with his head tilted to the side and one ear tipped up. JJ’s actually a pretty good artist, so the sketch is an accurate likeness of their scrappy little (big) dog with his mottled fur and the edge of his left ear missing. JJ’s also drawn an arrow pointing at the dog’s face, along with the words,  _ this dude needs a walk! _

The smile doesn’t leave Kie’s face as she pulls the note from the fridge and folds it up into her pocket for safekeeping. 

She opens the fridge and pulls out a container of coconut yoghurt, intending to add some to cereal for her breakfast. Just as she’s spooning the yoghurt into a bowl, she hears Fisher barking loudly out on the front porch, accompanied by some scuffling and a muffled voice saying, “Woah, buddy!”

Kie pauses, spoon mid-air, confused. She checks the time on the old clock on the wall — it’s twenty minutes fast, so she has to do some quick calculations to figure out that it’s only just hit quarter past eleven o’clock. No one’s scheduled to come over today. JJ sure isn’t meant to be home for another four hours, at  _ least. _

She walks over to the front door and pushes it open, peering outside to figure out who might be out there. There’s no one in the yard. There’s a car, though. A black Nissan Pathfinder — her father’s.

_ No way, _ she thinks.  _ No fucking way.  _ Who does her dad think he is, showing up at her house unannounced like this?

Fisher’s barks are coming from around the side of the house, out by the front porch. Anger powering her footsteps, Kie strides over in that direction as fast as she can when seven months pregnant. She rounds the corner to find her dad, crouched in the dirt, rubbing the head of a now-quiet Fisher, who has committed high treason against Kie by letting her dad pat him.

Kie stops in her tracks, crosses her arms over her chest, and says, as icily as she can make her voice, “Dad?”

Her dad turns to look at her, hand still in Fisher’s fur (who is slobbering all over her dad’s shoes, the cheating bastard). “Hi, Kiara,” he says, smiling tentatively, and despite everything that’s gone down between her parents and herself, Kie can’t help the warmth that blooms in her chest at seeing his face after months of no contact. 

The wrinkles on his forehead, his tanned brown skin, serious dark eyes, permanent five o’clock shadow. It’s all so achingly familiar, and for a moment, before she catches herself and remembers  _ why _ she hasn’t seen him in months, Kie wants to launch herself into her father’s arms. 

“What are you doing here?” she asks, genuinely confused. He hadn’t called. Or, at least, Kie hadn’t  _ answered _ a call from him. Why show up now?

Her dad stands up, Fisher whining and pawing at his knees for more petting. Kie whistles at the dog and sends him away. “We need to talk,” he says, and his voice sounds firm, but Kie looks right in his eyes and sees some kind of cautiousness there. She steps forward, into his space, strong. 

“I don’t want to talk, Dad,” Kie replies through her teeth, stone cold. 

“Kiara, please,” he sighs, reaching out to touch her arm. She pulls away, and he has the  _ nerve _ to look surprised. How the fuck was he thinking she was going to react with him showing up here like this? Kie hasn’t forgotten how it felt, sitting at that dinner table, listening to her father tell her she was  _ an embarrassment _ . “We’ve been trying to contact you for months but you wouldn’t pick up your phone,” he continues.

“I wonder why, Dad?” Kie responds, tilting her head to the side and raising a sharp brow.

Her father looks like he wants to say something to that but doesn’t. He lowers his voice and says, instead, “Kiara, sweetheart, listen to me. You need to come home. Staying in this…” he pauses to wave a hand at the house, “fish shack...with that boy—“ 

“His name is JJ,” she interrupts fiercely, carefully ignoring the way her stomach leaps when she hears her father call her parents’ house ‘home’. Because that’s not home anymore, right? That’s just a house she grew up in, spent a lot of time in. This ‘fish shack’, as her dad so kindly calls it, is home. 

_JJ_ _is home,_ Kie thinks, then mentally chides herself for feeling even a small sense of longing over the potential of being welcomed back to that old villa her dad so easily calls _home._

Her dad raises his hands and ducks his head in apology. “Okay. JJ. Either way, it’s not sustainable, Kiara.” When he looks at her again, it’s with tired eyes. “You’re, what, thirty weeks pregnant?” He gestures at her protruding belly, something sad in his voice. Maybe he’s thinking of all the days he and her mom have missed, watching her belly grow.  _ Good, _ Kie thinks savagely, _ let him feel bad. _

“Yes,” she begrudgingly confirms.

“Right,” he says, looking somewhat uncomfortable. “This is not the time to be—” he waves his hand in the direction of the Chateau again, “—to be living in  _ poverty _ in this shack, Kiara. You need real medical care. You need—”

“I’m doing just fine, Dad,” Kie interjects. “I have...savings.” (He doesn’t know about the gold — none of their parents do — and that’s gonna stay that way.) “I have a doctor. JJ is taking good care of me, you know. You still think of him as being this terrible, bad influence on me, but he’s—” she clears her throat, finding it’s closed up a little with emotion. Her dad can bag on  _ her _ all he wants, but she’s not going to tolerate any slander towards JJ or how he’s been taking care of her these past months. “He’s really shaped up. He’s doing the best he can.”

Her dad sighs again and shuffles back to sit himself down on the bottom porch step, elbows braced on knees. “I don’t doubt that, babygirl,” he says after a long moment, looking up at her. Then he shakes his head and pats the wood next to him, indicating for her to come and take a seat. And although she kind of hates him right now, he’s still her dad, and Kie still has this childlike pull towards him, this infantile need to be close to her father. It’s something she hadn’t known she’d been missing all this time, but she has.

Kie has always thought of herself as a ‘daddy’s girl’. That she was so much more like her father than her mother — and not only because they share the same brown skin, same dark, curled hair. But because her dad used to be a Pogue, before he met her mom and business at The Wreck took off. Because she knows he used to run wild with his friends around the island when he was her age. Because she knows he knows what it feels like to want to be independent, to want to do your own thing. Kie’s always felt that, if you took away the money, there’d still be a Pogue in him somewhere.

Her mom tries her best to understand Kie, but she often fails. Her father, despite his faults (of which there are many) gets her without even really trying.

It’s why it had always hurt so much when he’d tell her to stop hanging out with the boys, that if she  _ hung out with trash, she’d get dirty. _ It’s why it had been so painful when he had practically kicked her out of the house when she told her parents she was pregnant. 

It’s also why, with a heavy weight sinking in her chest, Kie reluctantly goes to sit next to him. Her belly seems to stick out even more when she sits, like she’s carrying around a whole beach ball under her shirt. 

Thankfully, her dad doesn’t try to put his arm around her or anything like that. Kie thinks that might be a little much — she may be sitting next to him, but she’s nowhere near agreeing with anything he’s saying.

When her dad begins talking again, it’s with a voice much softer than before. “Look, forget about me, for a moment,” he says, staring out at the ocean that starts at the end of the garden. “Think of your mom. I know you and her have not always seen eye to eye, but she’s been through all this before.” He pauses to look at Kie, offering up a small, knowing smile. “It’s gonna get tough, Kie. Birthing a baby is not easy. Neither is everything that comes after that…” Kie half hates that he’s talking at her like she’s still a child, like she doesn’t  _ know  _ this whole situation is so difficult, and half understands that her dad is trying her best to be caring. “Dealing with a newborn is hard,” he continues. “Your mom has wisdom and experience that will help you. And most of all—” he clears his throat. “We miss you, Kiara. You’re our only kid. This might be our only grandchild. It’s killing your mom to not be around while you’re going through this.”

And because Kie knows her father too well, she knows when he says  _ your mom _ he means himself, too.

(She’s supposed to hate them. She told JJ and Sarah and John B and Pope that she hated them for what they did -- or, rather, what they didn’t do. She’s not supposed to want to hug her dad. She’s not supposed to even entertain the thought of going back to live with them.

But why is it so hard to say no?)

Kie’s voice is gravelly with emotion when she replies, “I asked for your support and you wouldn’t give it to me. You let me leave.” She turns to face her dad, tears welling in her eyes despite her tightly clenched jaw. It hurts to remember that night — she hadn’t expected much from her parents, but she had certainly expected more than what she’d received. And then the storm, and the beach, and the turning up to the Chateau after what felt like hours of crying, and JJ trying his hardest to make it better for her. (And JJ’s touch, and JJ’s kisses, and everything after that.) “I was your kid, asking for your help, and you wouldn’t give it. Remember that?”

For the hundredth time in the past ten minutes, Kie’s dad lets out a sigh. This one is shaky, like he’s holding back tears, too. He ducks his head for a moment, seemingly to compose himself, then turns back to face her with glassy, wet eyes. “I’m sorry for the way we reacted, sweetheart,” he says softly. “It was a huge shock. I know that doesn’t excuse anything, but--” He pauses, and she glances over at him to find his eyes still watching her. There’s a sadness in them. Maybe a little regret. “I’m here now, Kie,” her dad says. “Please. Come home. At least until the baby is born.” Then, after a long pause, he quietly adds, “JJ will understand.” As if that suddenly makes everything better.

_ I don’t think he will, _ Kie thinks.  _ No, I  _ know _ he won’t. _

But then she thinks about how maybe the worst part about this whole pregnancy is that it’s made her realise just how lonely she’s been. Since...well, since Pope and Sarah and John B all left for college for the first time last year, and it was just her and JJ left behind. And more recently, since she’d cut off contact with her parents.

JJ has tried his best to be everything for her, and she appreciates the fuck out of him, because out of everyone, he knows how it feels to be alone. She loves that he’s always tried to make her feel like she belongs. And she  _ does  _ feel like that with him.

Even before all this shit — before Kie had even known what it would have been like to kiss ( _ properly _ kiss, not just peck during an eighth-grade dare) the lanky boy with the lean muscles and the scruffy hair and the sunkissed skin — JJ has always felt like home to Kie. They fit so well together. Facing every challenge side-by-side, whether they’re on a treasure hunt looking for gold, or at the ultrasound clinic watching a black-and-white smudge of a baby move around on a little screen. It’s always an adventure with JJ.

There is so much of her that can imagine a life with him.

And that’s a massive thing for Kie to admit, because she values her independence more than almost anything in the world.

But she can. She  _ can. _ She can actually see herself with this baby, all grown up and toddling around the living room of the Chateau, JJ kneeling on the floor with his arms wide open, encouraging his kid to  _ walk to daddy! _ , while Kie watches with an unfaltering grin from the couch. She can imagine them as a real family: her and JJ and the kid.

She thinks she probably loves him. Probably loves him more than she can put into words. Which is fucking terrifying.

(She thinks JJ’s probably in love with her, too, which is even worse.)

But there’s still this thing with the aching inside her chest, the acute loneliness that strikes her in the middle of the night when she’s lying awake. When Sarah forgets to text her back, when John B forgets her birthday, when Pope forgets to let her know that he’s got a new girlfriend.

It’s that left-behind feeling that cuts Kie open from the inside out.

And not only because it hurts to feel like she’s being, however unintentionally, left in the dust as her best friends race off into new lives and new jobs and new friendships, but because it forces her to admit to herself this one, hard truth: Kiara Carrera has no idea who she is without the Pogues.

Who is she without John B’s warmth, without Pope’s carefulness, without JJ’s joy? Who is she without Sarah Cameron? Who is she, really, without them?

She thinks that people were right when they said eighteen, nineteen and twenty were simultaneously the best and worst years of your life: you have so much more freedom than you had before and you’ve got a whole world of fun and adventure stretching ahead of you as far as your eyes can see, but it’s also a time of growing up and growing apart from those you thought you’d love forever, untwisting the vines that have grown together and pruning away the fruitless branches so there is more space to breathe.

That is not to say, however, that Kie doesn’t love the Pogues. She’d die for them twenty times over. And she knows they’d do the same for her. That will never change.

But there is something to be said for moving on and getting older and untangling yourself from the people whose souls are so deeply connected to yours that it’s hard to figure out where one spirit ends and one begins, and figuring out who you are when you’re just on your own.

Through this whole year, Kie has never technically been alone. JJ has always been there with her, and the rest of her friends just a phone call away. But the loneliness does not subside. It only grows louder, deeper.

Kie decides, then and there and however naively, that perhaps the only way to quieten that deafening ache of  _ who am I when I am on my own? _ is to do just that: be on her own for a while.

(JJ is not going to understand. Kie does not want to tell him. It might just break his heart. And hers.)

With those tears still in her eyes, heart heavy with the gravity of the situation, Kie offers her dad a tentative smile and says, “Okay. Fine. I’ll come home. For a little while.” 

Kie’s dad breathes out a sigh of relief and reaches over to wrap his arm around her shoulders and pull her into a side hug. She falls into it without thinking. “That’s wonderful, Kiara,” he says, pressing a kiss to the crown of her hair. “Thank you.”

Kie wants to say  _ I’m not doing this for you; I’m doing it for me and for this baby and the future of my family _ , but she bites her tongue and smiles again and allows her dad to start making plans about moving her home for the next couple of months.

All throughout the rest of the conversation, the only thought running through Kie’s head is:  _ Fuck. What am I gonna tell JJ? _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you know when you spend so long staring at the same words and rereading them over and over again that you don't even register what they say anymore??? same. i have no idea if this is even good or bad but hey, it's a chapter lol.
> 
> love 2 u all. thank you so much for reading xoxo


	14. the only constant thing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> an update??? not three days after the last one??? what universe are we living in?!
> 
> anyway i'm not gonna lie this is just a boatload of angst and i am sad for writing it but it is what it is. i hope you all enjoy the pain. love you all xoxo
> 
> songs of the chapter (highly recommended listening to reaaaally capture the Angst): 'god don’t leave me’ - highasakite; ‘to build a home’ - the cinematic orchestra; ‘into the red’ - james blake; ‘exile’ - taylor swift & bon iver

Friday’s are movie nights. JJ’s favourite. It’s kind of their tradition now, which is fun, because JJ’s never really grown up having family nights and dinner and things like that, unlike some of his friends. He likes that Friday nights have become their Thing, and secretly hopes that the tradition of comfort food, popcorn and a movie will continue when the baby is born.

He’s bought some shredded cheese, ground beef, and a bone from the butcher’s for Fisher to gnaw on (because the dog deserves a treat, too). The tortillas, sauce and other ingredients are in the pantry at home. It’s his turn to cook tonight, so he’s making the only thing he really knows how to cook on his own: quesadillas. 

He used to make them when his dad was passed out cold on the couch on evenings after school, stuffing the tortillas with whatever kind of cheese (after cutting off the mouldy bits) and sauce he could find in the fridge, too nervous to wake his dad up and ask for real food. The memories attached to this meal are kind of sad, really, now that he thinks about it. He guesses quesadillas are just another part of his past that he wants to reclaim for himself, because that perfect combination of meat, sauce, cheese and floury tortilla is too good to be left collecting dust in the attic of the house of JJ Maybank’s Painful Childhood Memories.

JJ lugs the bag of food up the driveway to the front door of the Chateau, already feeling a smile creep across his face as he thinks about seeing Kie’s face again in just a few moments. It’s sappy and stupid and Pope would definitely cringe, but JJ misses her when he’s at work. Even though he wakes up next to her every morning, even though he knows he’ll see her as soon as he gets home.

“Hey, baby,” he calls as he opens the front door, liking the way the pet name sounds on his tongue, grateful that he _actually_ gets to do this — come home to a girl he likes (loves, maybe, probably) with food for dinner and a smile on his face. 

JJ steps inside and immediately Fisher comes trotting over, sniffing at his legs and pawing at the bag of food. JJ throws his bike keys on the counter and rifles around in the shopping bag for Fisher’s bone. “Hey, Fisher!” he coos, bending down to ruffle the dog’s fur, “you want a bone?” Fisher yelps as JJ throws the bone through the open door and out onto the grass, bounding away after it. “Good boy!” JJ calls to the dog, then closes the door. Fisher will be preoccupied with the bone for a good thirty minutes, which will give JJ enough time to cook dinner without the dog fussing around his feet waiting to be fed scraps (of which JJ would end up giving him, of course, because how could he refuse that face?).

“Hey, JJ,” Kie says, looking over at him from her seat on the couch. “How was work?”

“Busy,” he sighs, kicking off his shoes then going to the kitchen to put away the groceries and wash his hands. “Coupla kooks came in to get their jet skis fixed. Tried to tell ‘em that it would take us a good day or two but they wanted them fixed this afternoon. I worked so long I didn’t get a lunch break. Fuckin’ starving now.” He lifts up the bag of cheese and the package of meat to show her. “I got stuff for quesadillas, by the way. Did you get my note?”

Kie smiles and nods. “Yeah,” she says. “I took Fisher for a walk.”

“Cool. Also— I know I said it was your choice of movie tonight, but I’m really feeling something Disney. Emperor’s New Groove, perhaps? It’s a classic, you know. Gremlin needs to watch all the classics. I read in that pregnancy book John B got me that babies can hear sounds in the womb, so we can start them early with some Disney. What do you think?” It’s only once he stops talking and pauses his fussing with getting food out for dinner that he realises he’s been rambling, and that Kie has been sitting there silently. Which is unusual. Because Kie is never really silent. 

Unless she’s mad.

Or sad.

Or keeping a secret. 

“Kie? What’s up?” he asks cautiously, nervous he might not like the answer. JJ notices for the first time since coming home that Kie doesn’t look happy. Her face is paler than normal, she sits with a rigid back on the couch, and while her lips are curved up at the edges in some sort of smile as she looks over at him, it’s a strange, sad one. There’s a faraway look in her eyes, like she’s not really seeing him. Like she’s not really here.

He thinks she might be about to tell him something bad.

When she opens her mouth, he knows he’s correct. “I...actually wanted to talk to you about something,” she says, which makes his heart drop to his fucking balls because _shit_ , it’s never good when a girl says that.

“Oh,” he replies, walking carefully over to the couch and sitting down next to her, only they’re three feet apart. “That sounds serious.”

She shakes her head, braids jostling. “It’s not,” she promises, but then she’s scrunching up her nose and sighing and he thinks _yeah, right._ “Okay, maybe it is,” she admits. “I don’t know.”

JJ tries his best to make his voice as soft as he can when he asks, “What is it, Kie?” 

She looks incredibly uncomfortable when she says, quietly, “My...dad came over today.”

His eyebrows jump to the roof. “Your _dad_? Here? Why?” JJ leans forward onto his knees, frowning.

“He wanted to know why I hadn’t been answering my phone.”

“Really. And that was it?”

“Yeah.” Then she’s shaking her head again. “No.” It’s not like Kie to be indecisive when telling him things. She always seems to know what she’s doing. It scares him. “He— he asked me to come home.”

Now his stomach drops, too, but all the way to the floor. “Come home?” JJ asks, puzzled. “Like, back to their place?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, what did you say?” He falls back into the couch cushions and forces a laugh. This has _got_ to be a joke. There’s no _way_ Kie would ever agree to go back to her parents house. She hates them. (At least, she _says_ she hates them.) “Did you tell him to fuck right off?”

“JJ—”

“I’m kidding,” he says, lifting his hands in surrender and chuckling dryly, “I’m kidding.” Although he’s not. Not really. And especially not because Kie’s face is falling and she’s looking at him like— she’s _looking at him like she—_ “Wait— Kie—” JJ stutters, sitting up straight. “You didn’t say—”

And there’s that sad smile again, except she’s not really smiling at all. She’s just...looking at him, as if he’s a child who doesn’t understand, who can’t handle being told _no._ “JJ…”

“What did you say to him, Kie.” It’s a growled statement, not a question.

She blinks. “It’s complicated, JJ. It’s so—”

“It’s not that fucking complicated, Kie,” he interuppts, forcing the words out through his clenched teeth. “Did you tell him yes, or no?”

There’s a long, heavy pause. Then she’s ducking her head and staring at her socked feet and saying, “I said I would.”

He inhales sharply through his nose, leans forwards onto his elbows again, then exhales in a huff of breath and runs a hand through his hair. He can’t look at her. “You said you’d go home?” he mumbles, staring at a stain on the wooden floorboards.

Kie stirs next to him, pulling her knees up to her chin. He can only see the movement from his peripheral vision, and can’t quite see her face. “Yeah. I— Dad said some stuff about why it’s important for me to be with Mom during this time and...I guess I just...it made sense. I felt like I couldn’t say no.”

But when has Kie _ever_ felt pressured into doing something? Ever let herself be walked all over? “You couldn’t say no?” JJ asks, looking across to her, at her eyes that stare blankly at the wall on the other side of the room, and thinks _who is this girl? This isn’t my Kie._

“Yeah,” she whispers, flat, like she knows it’s a lie.

 _How has so much changed since I left this morning?_ When he’d kissed her goodbye, she’d been peacefully dozing in their bed, enjoying a lie-in after having to get up at 3 am to vomit in the shower. (Turns out nausea doesn’t stop after the first trimester! Gee, what a treat.) He had murmured a goodbye as his lips pressed against her cheek and she’d grumbled when he had pulled away, reaching out a hand to grasp his arm, whispering, _“Be safe.”_

Now? Now she’s telling him, in as many words, that he is not enough for her.

His throat is going dry. It kind of hurts to breathe. “Huh. You’re not getting bored of me now, are you?” There he is again: good ol’ JJ, always turning serious situations into a fucking joke because he can’t deal with basic human emotion.

_Fuck._

She knows what he’s trying to do. Knows him too well to let him do it. “J—” she admonishes.

“Chill, Kie,” he retorts, no jokes left. “I was kidding.”

“Hey. Don’t tell me to _chill_ ,” she snaps. She has a right to. He knows he’s being a dick, but he just can’t— he can’t quite process what she’s telling him. 

JJ stands up, shoves his hands in his pockets. “If you want to go back to your parents, that’s fine,” he says. He begins to walk over to the kitchen to fuss with dinner, just so his hands have something to do. “I just think it’s _kinda_ funny that you spend all this time talking shit about them, about how they don’t support you, about how they’re fuckin’ terrible parents, _just_ to go back to them the second they ask you to come home.”

“Maybe because they’re my fucking _parents_ , JJ,” Kie bites back, lips curled up into a snarl. Okay, good. She’s getting mad at him. That’s better than her just...sitting there, looking at him like he’s a stupid little kid. “Maybe if you had— whatever. You don’t understand.” 

Alright. _That_ hurt. 

She must realise the mistake she made in saying that, because he watches guilt flash across her face.

 _Good._ That was a low fucking blow, especially from her. Kie’s sassy, confident, taking no shit from anyone ever — but she’s never downright _mean._

“Yeah, nice one, Kie. That’s _real_ nice,” he scoffs, busying himself with starting to peel some carrots to have in their salad (because, yeah, he’s a fucking responsible adult who makes salads). 

“I need to be with my family,” Kie says after a pause, like that’s supposed to be a great excuse. He’s really fucking trying not to take this personal, but when she says shit like that, it’s hard not to.

The corners on his mouth turn down into a frown. He focuses on the carrot in his hand and tries not to slice his thumb. “And I’m _not_ your family?” he asks, trying hard to keep any bitterness out of his voice.

She sighs. “JJ, you _know_ that I—“

He waves his hands in the air, peeler in one of them, gesturing to the scraps of carrot in front of him, the view out to the yard where, in the dimming late-afternoon light, he can still see Fisher running about with the bone. “I’m trying my best here, Kie,” he says, strained.

Kie runs a hand over her face and sighs again. “I know you are. And you’ve been so amazing, but— they’re my parents, JJ. I need to be with them.” She shakes her head. “I don’t want this to turn into a fight.”

There’s something she’s not saying. There’s something she’s holding back. This decision can’t just be about wanting to be with her parents. It makes no fucking sense. 

For the life of him, JJ cannot imagine Kie’s feelings towards him and their life together changing so much in the span of one afternoon, but perhaps that is really what is happening here. Maybe the thing she’s not saying is: _I don’t love you the way you love me._

“We’re not fighting,” JJ says, gritting his teeth and resuming his peeling of the carrots, fighting against the sick feeling in his gut. “We’re just...discussing.” He hates fighting, especially with Kie. It makes him feel awful. Reminds him of his dad. “You sure you have to _move_ there? Can’t you stay here, and we can go on like normal, and you can just see them whenever you want?” He sounds like he’s whining. He probably is.

“I don’t— I think it’s time to—” she stutters, which she never does, because she’s always careful with her words. “I need to be with my family, JJ,” she repeats. “The baby’s gonna be here soon. They want me home. Look, it’s not even a big deal. I’ll see you all the time.”

 _That’s not the issue, here,_ he thinks sourly. “Yeah, you’ve said that. I got the message loud and clear. So that’s it, then? You’re leaving?” And oh God, okay, he knows he’d thought previously that he’d be okay with her leaving if she needed some freedom, but when it seems like it’s actually happening? Fuck him, but he can’t handle that. He can’t just watch her leave.

That’s not how this whole thing between them is supposed to work.

He’s supposed to take care of her. He’s supposed to make her feel safe. And they’re supposed to be happy.

 _“_ Don’t yell at me. I thought we weren’t _fighting,”_ she reprimands, half-sarcastic.

“I’m not fucking _yelling,_ Kie,” JJ grunts back, “and we’re not fighting.”

“Yes, you are. And yes, we are.” She stands up from the couch and begins to walk towards him, one hand resting almost protectively on her bump. “Why are you getting mad about this, anyway?” she says, brows furrowed. “You can even come with me, if you wanted.”

 _That’s not the point!_ he wants to yell. The point is that she’s thinking about leaving him and this place he’s tried so hard to make good for her. “I’m not moving into your parents house, Kie. Jesus Christ.”

“Jeez, it was just an idea,” Kie replies, brushing past him as she walks into the kitchen. “It’s not like I’m breaking up with you. Besides, we’re not even really _together—_ ”

“The _fuck_ are you talking about?” His hand stills halfway through peeling another carrot and he turns to face her, as she’s now standing behind him in the kitchen, rummaging through a cabinet for a glass.

“Don’t raise your voice at me, J,” she says, turning to fill up her glass with water.

He thinks that it’s kind of weird that they’re having a fully-fledged _‘discussion’_ (which is probably going to turn a lot more heated in a few moments) while they’re also doing their normal routine stuff in the kitchen. It’s painfully domestic, like they’ve been together for a long time, and this is just _one of those days._

Except they haven’t been together for that long, and Kie is telling him she wants to leave, and he’s fucking terrified that if she goes she won’t come back.

“I’m not trying to,” he replies, setting the peeler down for good (he doesn’t feel like cooking anymore, because something tells him this is going to end with Kie leaving before she could have a chance to eat, anyway) and crossing his arms over his chest. There are goosebumps on his skin. There must be a draft coming from somewhere in the house. (Or maybe it’s just because he still hasn’t changed out of his work clothes yet, and he’s wearing only a dirty t-shirt and overalls while it’s the first week of November.) “I’m just trying to understand what this is all about.”

“I don’t know!” Kie exclaims after taking a sip of water and loudly setting the glass back down on the counter. She leans back against the counter on the side of the kitchen opposite him, over by the stove, and crosses her arms over her belly. They mirror each other. Right down to the angry scowls on their faces. She starts gesturing periodically with her hands as she talks, as if she’s trying to communicate with him in this weird sign language she’s just made up. As if that’s supposed to help him understand. “I guess it’s just— everything’s been building up, and we’ve been pretending like everything is so perfect—”

“I’m not pretending,” JJ interjects, hurt. What is she trying to say here? He’s tried to tell her so many times that he has feelings for her. That he— that he—

 _Fuck._ How does she not _get_ it? Isn’t it obvious?

“I don’t mean pretending about our _feelings_ ,” she insists, but the damage has already been done. He’s getting mad, now. Crossing over from frustration and hurt into plain anger. “I just— like— how do you really see this working, JJ? We’re both just barely twenty. The gold bars can only take us so far. Without my parents, we have no one.”

“But what happened to _not needing anyone else_ , Kie?” He can’t help himself. 

That’s when she explodes. And JJ realises that he probably shouldn’t have lit the match, because now he’s going to have to deal with a fucking wildfire.

“You don’t _get_ it, JJ!” she blurts, eyes wide, fists balled at her sides. “My whole fucking— _God,_ my entire teenage years have revolved around you three boys — first it was John B, and then it was Pope, and now it’s _you_.” She jabs a finger at him. JJ’s heart goes to his throat. He was not expecting this. 

More bullshit about how she wanted to go home to her family (who fucking needs parents, anyway?), yeah, but not this. 

And he was _not_ expecting it to escalate so quickly. 

If he was more of an asshole, he’d make some comment about _pregnancy hormones_ and _calming the fuck down_ , but since he has an actual brain in his skull, he tries to deescalate the situation instead by pleading, “Wait, Kie, we don’t have to talk about this right now.”

Kie shakes her head and says resolutely, sharply, “No, I want to talk about this. Look, I know all this is my fucking fault,” she continues. “Because I kissed you first, and I let you fuck me when I wasn’t thinking straight, and now we’ve got this baby to worry about, and no matter what happens between us, we’ll always be connected through this.” His heart feels like it’s fucking shattering into a thousand pieces, which is cliche as all hell, but awfully true. There are tears in her eyes. _Does he go to wipe them away?_ No. He doesn’t think that’s the kind of movie that’s playing out here. “That’s not a bad thing at all,” she says, softer now, probably noticing the wetness gathering in his own eyes. “Trust me: I love— I love being with you, J.” Kie sighs, heavily, then falls back on the edge of the counter again. “I just need to figure out who I am when I’m just _me._ And this might be the only time I can do that before the baby comes. I need to figure out what it is that I want.”

Look, therapy has been good for him. Great, even. He’s slowly working through the trauma that he’s amassed from his father, learning how to give himself grace and to ask for help from those he loves when it gets to be a little too much inside his head.

What he’s still working on, though, is trust. Trusting that when the people he loves say they love him back, they mean it. Trusting that he doesn’t need to hold people and memories in an iron grip in order to make them stay, that they won’t leave him the second he loosen his hands.

Trusting that when Kie says she’s not leaving forever, just momentarily, she means it.

He’s not so good at that part yet.

“And that’s why you’re leaving?”

“Yes.” She exhales. “I need some time,” she says. She’s picking at her fingernails now, like she does when she’s nervous or embarrassed. 

“And how long have you been feeling this way?” he asks, voice cracking. When she doesn’t answer, only looks at him with sad eyes, he pushes painfully on. “Because I feel like a fucking idiot now, walkin’ around thinkin’ we’re all good, that you feel the same way about me as I do about you—”

She leans forward and raises her hands like she wants to move toward him and wrap him in her arms, caress the side of his face, thumb tracing the line of the small scar on his jaw, like she does when he’s feeling anxious. But she doesn’t move, just says, “I _do_ feel that way, JJ, that hasn’t changed.”

That ugly monster called Doubt rears its head again. Compels him to bite back, “I guess I’m just obviously not fucking _good enough_ for you, right?”

He watches her shoulder slump, her mouth twist into a grimace. “It’s not about you at all, JJ,” she says slowly. “It’s about me. About who I am, and who I want to be. You’ve been to therapy to sort your shit out about your dad, which is amazing, and I’m so fucking proud of you. But I’ve got my own shit too.” The palms of her hands run over her bump. JJ wishes he could put his hands there, too. Feel Gremlin kick. Maybe rub some shea butter into her skin, like she loves him doing at the end of a long day. He can’t, of course, because they’re having a fight, and it’s a bad one, and if he tried to touch Kie right now she’d probably slap him. “And I need time to process some things.”

He knows he’s fighting a losing battle, but arms himself to the teeth regardless. “Process what? What kind of thinking can you do at your parents that you can’t do here?”

What was that thing his therapist said to him once? _Hurt people hurt people._ Is that what’s happening here? He knows he’s lashing out. He knows he feels hurt. And from the fire that flashes in her eyes again, he knows he’s hurting her, too.

But he can’t bring himself to stop, to call off the war. The wound that’s opened up in his chest again hurts too much to keep him from fighting.

Kie erupts again, like those baking-soda-and-vinegar volcanoes they all made in fourth grade science class, but much less fun.

“I just _told_ you, JJ!” she exclaims, exasperated. “That I don’t know who the fuck I am without you!”

She pauses. The words echo in the air for a moment, hanging heavy. They rest on his shoulders, weigh him down, make his heart sink.

Kie catches her breath and continues, tears on her cheeks now, although she still keeps any following sobs in check. “Or Sarah, or John B, or Pope,” she adds. “And that was fine when we all lived here and we were kids but we’re not kids anymore, J. And everyone’s moving on, and doing bigger and better things, and I’m— we’re— I’m _stuck_ here, with no clue as to what I want out of life. Jesus, my biggest goal was to go to Thailand for six months.” She stops to laugh humorlessly, shaking her head. “As if that was gonna magically change my life. And now I’m— I can’t even do that, because of _this—”_ she finishes, gesturing to her belly.

When she explains it like that, JJ gets it. He really does. There are moments — probably more than he’d care to admit — when he feels like that, too. Like life is spinning in circles around him, faster and faster and faster, while he’s stuck standing still, watching the colours whizz by. 

Admitting this to her, however, would mean admitting a weakness. Would mean exposing himself once again: pulling back the scar tissue on his heart, letting her see all the twisted-up tendons and bruised muscles behind the marred skin, all the ugly parts of him. 

Kie already knows some of those less-desirable parts of him, having lived with him for months and accompanied him to at least half of all his therapy sessions, but he decides in that moment that she doesn’t need to find out any more. 

There’s a voice in his head yelling _you’re making a mistake! End this before you say something you’ll regret!_ But, like with many of the voices-of-reason he hears when he’s about to do something stupid, he ignores it. And so, instead of saying _I understand_ , he snarls, “Oh, alright, so now it’s _my fault_ for getting you pregnant, huh?”

Kie flinches like someone faked a punch in her direction. JJ’s stomach aches. “I never fucking said it was your fault, JJ,” she hisses in reply, hands dropping to her sides and curling into tight fists. “You’re not _listening_ to me. God _damn_ it, I’m not trying to fight with you!” she exclaims, voice straining. “This is exactly what I’m afraid of: that we don’t know how to function without each other. Like we’re relying on one another too much. I don’t wanna be fucking— _codependent._ ” 

She chokes on a sob, then, and JJ notices that those tears that had been quietly wetting her cheeks are now rolling down. 

Kiara never cries. He’s only seen her cry twice, maybe three times, in all the time he’s known her. 

Again, there’s that voice in his head telling him to quit while he’s ahead, but his mouth is moving without his permission, saying, “I’m not asking you to, like, merge your entire life with mine, Kie. I just don’t get why this — this here, right now — isn’t enough for you.” 

Then Kie is throwing her hands in the air and shouting, “Because I’m not like you, okay? I can’t live like this forever!” and if his heart wasn’t broken before, it is now. Because here it is. Laid out plain to see. The thing he had been most worried about: that she doesn’t love him the way he loves her. That she doesn’t view him as someone who has goals and plans and dreams, too. That playing happy families with him will never be enough for her. 

His jaw goes slack and all the air rushes out of his lungs.

Kie stares at him, motionless, tear tracking down her cheeks, nose wrinkled. Pretty brown eyes wide, full of conflict, like she has that same voice echoing in her head, saying _don’t say anything you’ll regret later._

It seems that Kie is as stubborn as him, though, because instead of stepping forward and taking him in her arms and sobbing onto his shoulder like he wants her to (because they’re a _team_ and they work through problems _together_ ), she whispers, “I mean— _fuck_ I don’t even have a _job_ , JJ. I’m not going to college. I’m pregnant. I don’t know what I want, but I know it’s gotta be something other than this.” She sounds like the words are painful to say to him, like each syllable is a piece of jagged glass cutting lines in her throat. Regardless, she says them.

He probably should be glad that she’s being honest, not sugarcoating anything. Honesty is important in a relationship -- something else he learned from therapy. 

But how could honesty be good when it hurts like this?

“More than this?” he retorts, sounding just as pained as she had. “And do you think _this_ is all I want to be? You think I like working a shit job with shit pay, worrying all the time how I’m gonna be able to support you and a _baby_?” He’s being mean. He’s being so fucking mean, but she’s being mean right back, and he’s too riled up now to stop. “Your parents are offering you more than I can give. That’s it, right? You’ve had your little ‘roughing it, Pogue style’ experiment, and now you wanna go home to your fuckin’ Kook mansion and your parents fuckin’ Kook money? Life on the Cut got too hard, so you’re ditching? Again?” He watches her cry, presses the heels of his hands hard against the edge of the counter until his skin pinches to keep himself from crossing the no-mans-land of the kitchen linoleum and touching her, apologising, swallowing his words. He watches her cry and he pushes on. “I try so fucking hard to make this okay for you. You say we’re not together, but Kie—” JJ waves a hand above his head, gesturing to the room they’re in. “You’re living in my fucking house, we cook dinner together every night, we sleep in the same bed, you’re pregnant with my _kid_ , and I fucking _love_ you, okay?”

It slips out before he can stop it, just like the angry, hurt tears that are now falling down his cheeks.

He hadn’t meant to say it, but there it goes. An honest confession. (Honesty is good, right?)

The words fill the air with a heavy heat that sticks in his throat when he breathes. He watches her face, at the myriad of complicated emotions that flit across it in the span of a few seconds. 

_Will she say it back?_

No. 

Her expression settles onto a look of sorrowful anger. “You can’t say that to me, JJ,” she says sternly, although the tears that still fall betray her, just a little bit. “Not like this.”

He swallows hard. “Why not? It’s how I feel,” he insists, because it is. 

Because JJ Maybank has been in love with Kiara Carrera since she kissed him on the couch last November. Maybe even since that fucking birthday party when he was fourteen.

He’s in love with her. Has been all this time, just never knew how to articulate how he felt. He knows it now. Why won’t she let him tell her?

“But not like this. Not like _that._ ” she replies, and her voice sounds far away, and he can’t tell if that’s because the ringing in his ears is getting louder or if she’s whispering, because his heart is beating double-time in his chest and his face is going red and he’s not sure how to think logically anymore.

“I don’t know how else I’m supposed to say it,” he says dejectedly, shoving his hands in his overall pockets, because it’s true -- he’s never done this before. How is he supposed to say it? Was this a bad time?

 _Fuck. This was definitely a bad time._

She’s still crying when she whispers, “I have to go, JJ,” and pushes past him to exit the kitchen and make for the door.

“Kie, baby—” he pleads, turning to face her, to follow her down the hall, to reach out a hand and try to touch her, try to stop her--

She shrugs him off. “Don’t call me baby,” she says, bending down to slip on her shoes and then to shrug on a jacket. It’s raining. He’s only just noticed. “I need some space,” she says, making a point not to look at him. “I’ll— I’ll call you.”

Then she is opening the door, and the cold wind is blowing inside and making his eyes sting, and Kie is walking away from him into the darkening evening without a look back at him, and he’s calling after her, “Kie. _Kiara._ Please don’t— _Kie!”_ But she doesn’t look back. Just gets in her car, starts the engine, pulls away.

Fisher rounds the corner from where he’d been blissfully chewing his bone out the front of the house and chases after the car, howling at its retreating form. 

_I know, buddy_ , JJ thinks as he calls the dog back to the house and ruffles the wet hair on Fisher’s head as he whines. _I don’t want her to go either._

She left him once, and now she’s left him again.

And yes, to be fair, when she ditched them for Sarah Cameron she wasn’t just turned twenty (a few weeks ago, a little over a month after his own birthday) and carrying his child but fourteen and immature. But it hurt back then, and it hurts now. 

God _fucking_ damn it. He _knew_ he liked her a lot, knew he was falling in love with her for sure, but he didn’t realise until now just _how much_ he actually loves her. 

Loves her. For real. For fucking _real._ And he’d said it -- blurted it out like an idiot, embarrassing himself completely. 

_This is the moment,_ he thinks as he watches the red tail lights of her car fade away down the drive, _this is the moment that matters._ The one where all the chips fall into place, the other shoe drops, the puzzle is complete. 

_Please don’t leave me,_ JJ thinks as her car disappears down the road. When will he see her again? _You’re the only thing I’ve got that’s constant._

Fisher is still whining against his legs, somehow aware that something bad has happened. JJ bends down to crouch next to the dog on the front step, scratching him behind his ears until he calms down.

“I guess it’s just you and me now, huh, Fisher?” JJ murmurs. Fisher’s big brown eyes look soulfully up at him and a lump sticks in JJ’s throat. “Hey, don’t look at me like that, dude,” he says, “it’s not my fault.” He sighs and sits himself down on the step, one hand still in Fisher’s fur, one propped up under his chin, elbow on a denim-clad knee. “Okay, it’s a little my fault. She started it, though.” 

Fisher licks at JJ’s hand as if to simultaneously say _yeah, right_ and _keep petting me, please._ JJ obliges, scratching Fisher’s belly when he rolls over onto his back. “Why’d I say I love her, huh, buddy? How am I that stupid? So fucking stupid.” He smooths a hand over Fisher’s bunged-up ear. “And I don’t even know if I mean it.” 

Fisher peers up at him and tilts his head to the side, almost like the dog version of rolling his eyes. JJ wants to laugh. Does, quietly. “Nah, what am I saying,” he chuckles to himself. “I do.” JJ lets all the air whoosh out of his lungs in one big sigh. “Fuck. I’m going crazy, talking to a dog. You’re not gonna leave me, are you, Fisher?” He gives the dog’s belly one more good scratch before standing up and shoving his hands back in his pockets. “No. You’re good like that. You stick around.” 

At that, Fisher rolls back onto his belly and begins to whine again, trotting into the house and sniffing at the couple of pairs of shoes Kie had left behind. JJ realises that she’d taken no clothes, no shoes, nothing with her when she’d stormed out. Will she need to come back for some stuff? Should he call her and ask if she needs anything?

No. That would be dumb. Right? Definitely.

Besides, she’ll be back soon. 

(But then again, they’ve never had a fight this bad before. He doesn’t know how this is all supposed to work.)

“No, she’s not coming back, buddy,” JJ says to Fisher, who’s still pawing at one of Kie’s dusty old Vans. “Not yet. We’ll have to do without her for a bit. Boys weekend. Just you ‘n me.”

_And hopefully it’s just one fuckin’ weekend._

Before stepping back inside, JJ looks out over the mess of overgrown weeds and gravel that makes up the driveway leading up to the Chateau. Rain pours down in a heavy sheet, forming muddy puddles in potholes, big raindrops splashing at his feet. It fits, right? Rain, on the worst day of his year so far. _Fuck._

In his mind’s eye he can still see those red tail lights disappearing into the dark, taking with them the girl he loves.

She’ll be back. _She will,_ he tells himself. _She’s Kie. You’re JJ. It is what it is._

She’s his best friend. The mother of his child. The girl he _loves._

Already rehearsing potential apology speeches in his head, JJ turns back inside, when he’s faced with the sight of the unfinished dinner preparations sitting on the kitchen counter. The half-peeled carrots stare at him, taunting. A reminder of all the good things he could have had today, and all the shit he got instead.

“Fuck you, too,” he whispers to the carrots as he sweeps them into the trash. 

Whatever. He doesn’t feel like eating, anyway.

It’s probably only six o’clock at the latest but JJ doesn’t want to do anything else but sleep. Maybe he’ll wake up and everything will be okay. Kie will be here, laying beside him in their bed, her cheek pressed against his bare back, snoring like a train and beautiful all the same. 

JJ can’t bring himself to sleep in that bed without Kie, so he grabs a blanket and turns out the light, curling up into a ball on the pull-out couch bed. Fisher, having finished his sorrowful inspection of Kie’s forgotten shoes, tucks himself into JJ’s side. Usually, JJ doesn’t let Fisher sleep in the bed with them, but tonight JJ is so desperate not to feel alone that he allows the dog to stay. 

In a moment that reminds him of the night he’d found out Kie was pregnant, JJ stares across at the wall of Routledge family photos. 

All the usual pictures are there: Big John and John B catching fish down at the docks, John B with his first surfboard, a grainy photograph of John B and his mom. There’s a new one, though. One that makes JJ’s heart seize in his chest and tears prick at his eyes.

(It’s dark, and the moonlight that filters through the windows paints all the photographs in shades of grey, but JJ knows this photo like the back of his own hand.)

It’s a photo he’d taken on John B’s old film camera of Kiara that summer, probably a few weeks or so after they found out she was pregnant. She’s lying on the sand in her favourite orange bikini, brown skin glowing, head tilted towards the camera with an open paperback book blocking her eyes from the sun. Even then, she’s still squinting, nose wrinkled. She’s smiling, but she’s not looking directly at the camera. She’s looking past it.

At him.

Grinning at him with a secret smile, like she knows something he doesn’t, so casually beautiful. 

Had he loved her even then?

_Yes._

* * *

He calls Pope in the morning, because a conversation with Pope fixes everything.

Except it doesn’t, and JJ feels just as fucking awful about the night before as he had when he’d gone to sleep.

The picture on the wall haunts him all day long.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahhh fuck. sorry abt this one guys...........pls forgive me 4 the pain. it will get better i promise
> 
> butttt.....JJ SAID THE L WORD???? i'm so proud of my boy. even though it was the worst timing ever and not fair on kie. boy's finally expressing his feelings. i wanna cry
> 
> (and we all know kie loves him too. she's just gotta figure that part out by herself.)
> 
> thank you for all the continued support - the kudos, the comments, the lovely messages on tumblr. when i say i appreciate all of you i genuinely mean it! please continue coming to me with ideas for future scenes/chapters/feelings and scream about these two absolute idiots with me. it gives me so much joy you have no idea


	15. that good ol' carrera pride

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello loyal readers i know ya'll want to be free of the angst but it ain't happenin yet my friends i'm SORRY. this is a little less angsty i think?? like more hopeful??? anyway next chapter is the reunion *big spoiler* so happy days are coming again. enjoy!!
> 
> songs for this chapter: ‘wiseman’ - frank ocean; ‘home soon’ - vagabon; ‘some day soon’ - alexi murdoch; ‘old friends’ - coldplay. find them in my SIC playlist here: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3DpMrxkuDIReLiNIyBXBV1?si=PG-FbE-NTNu2HVj9Sjqidw
> 
> (p.s. looks like i'm posting chapters one month to the date the last one was posted now??? WILD. rip to the days i posted one a week ahkdfhs quarantine was a different level)

As soon as the sight of the Chateau — and JJ standing dejectedly on its front step — leaves her rearview mirror, Kiara knows she’s made a mistake.

That look in his eyes when he asked  _ you said you’d go home? _ Yeah. She should have stopped while she was ahead. She should never have said anything. Should have called her dad up, said  _ I can’t leave him, dad, I need to stay. _

JJ is not someone to be abandoned. Kie knows that better than anyone.

But here she is, driving away, leaving him all alone.

She has half a mind to stop the car and turn around right now, to swing open the door of the house, say  _ I’m sorry I was an asshole, I wasn’t thinking, it was the hormones, you knocked me up, remember? _ and throw herself into his arms. And he’d be a little angry with her to begin, but then he’d kiss her and remember why he—

—why he said he  _ loved _ her.

_ And I fucking love you, okay? _

The words ring in her ears as she drives.

Why had he said it? Did he understand what it meant for him to say it? 

(She didn’t say it back. Why didn’t she say it back?)

JJ Maybank  _ loves _ her. And he’d said those words in the middle of their worst fight, right after he berated her for ditching him for the ‘Kook life’, right after she’d told him that what he was offering her was not enough.

How could they have said those things to each other and have had the fight end with a fucking declaration of  _ love? _ How is that supposed to work?

She’s mad at him for blurting it out like that. Kie knows that there would have been no malicious intent behind the words; he would have said them out of genuine feeling, rather than in an attempt to force her to stay, taking advantage of her vulnerability. She’s still angry at him, though, because whether he meant the declaration as a threat or not, it sure felt like one.

_ Not like this, _ she’d said.  _ You can’t say that to me. _

He hadn’t meant it to be cruel, but it was.

And she didn’t say it back.

Why not?

Kie knows she loves him. Has loved him in one way or another for longer than she can remember. 

She loves the way he talks, the way he laughs, the way he says her name, his hair, his eyes, the calluses on his palms. She loves him when he’s attempting to drink a beer facing into the wind while The Pogue is zipping across the water, and she loves him when he’s quietly crying into her shoulder after his third therapy session, the one where he finally opened up about the abuse he suffered at the hands of his father. 

And it wasn’t even the addition of sex to their friendship that changed it all for her. It was the time in between, the before and after, that transformed everything.

All those late nights, before the baby, when they’d sit on the couch and drink copious amounts of alcohol and watch the Simpsons on silent with subtitles, more interested in talking about random shit like  _ do you think alternate universes exist? _ and  _ Doritos lost all my respect when they created the Mountain Dew flavour _ : those were the nights she’d fallen in love with him, bit by bit, slowly but surely.

She loves her sweet, loyal, carefree rebel boy. Her best friend. The boy who got her pregnant, and the boy who is going to be the best dad the world’s ever seen.

JJ Maybank loves her. Kiara Carrera loves  _ him. _

And she left him, standing there on that front step, broken-hearted and confused.

She thinks all these things but still doesn’t turn the car around because of all that good ol’ Carrera pride she’s got running through her blood, the stuff that runs hot and fast and doesn’t stop to think about things like apologies.

Kie told JJ, and her dad, that she was going back to her parents’ place because she needed some time away to figure out what it is she wants out of her life. Despite the way her heart has been ripped in half — one part still stuck in her chest, the other left in JJ’s hands — Kie knows that she has to go through with this plan of hers.

If she doesn’t — if she turns the car around right now — she’ll always wonder what would have happened. 

Will she find security in her time away? Peace? A grounded sense of self? Who fucking knows.

But she feels as if she owes it to herself — and to this baby, and to JJ — to find out. 

Kie doesn’t say a thing to her parents when she arrives home, dripping wet and still crying. To their credit, they don’t say anything, either. They keep their mouths shut as she slams the front door and trudges down the hall to her old bedroom with wet shoes leaving marks on the carpet. They don’t comment on the smudged mascara under her eyes or the way her mouth is set sternly in a sour frown. They let her escape to her room in peace, gracefully allowing her time to process what has just happened without being badgered about it.

She hears them talking, though. The walls between her bedroom and the living room, where they sit watching the news with the volume turned way down low, are very thin. 

_ “Do you think we did the right thing?”  _ Kie hears her mom ask as she lies face-up on her old bed, staring at the blank white ceiling.

_ “Yes,” _ replies her dad.  _ “She needs to be here. With us.” _

_ “She seems to really care about him, though, Mike. We shouldn’t be separating them like this.” _

There’s some hushed discussion that Kie can’t quite make out, but she makes out the end of it: her mom’s voice saying,  _ “I’m going to go and talk to her.” _ Then the sound of footsteps coming down the hall.

Kie, not wanting to talk to her mom or dad or  _ anyone _ right now, reaches for the light switch and flips it off, then turns on her side and fakes being asleep, even though it’s barely eight o’clock.

When her mom comes knocking on her door a few moments later, Kie does not stir. Her mom whispers,  _ “Kiara?” _ then,  _ “I’ll come back later,” _ almost to herself.

Thankfully, she’s gone after only a handful of seconds, and Kie can roll over onto her back again and stop feigning sleep. Once she’s sure her mom has gone back to the living room, her footsteps growing quieter as she retreats down the hall, Kie carefully gets herself out of bed and begins to undress for bed.

As she pulls down the stretchy waistband of her maternity trousers (not the cutest things in the world, but she thrifted them for only a few bucks), a piece of crumpled paper falls from her pocket. She picks it up from the floor and tenderly unfolds it. 

It’s the note that JJ had stuck to the fridge that morning. (Shit, had it really only been that morning?) She begins to read it again:  _ Hey, pretty mama… _

The rest is unreadable, seeing as her vision is blurred with tears. 

The baby ( _ Marley _ , she thinks) kicks against the hand Kie has cradling her belly. She breathes in sharply. 

“Hey, little one,” she whispers to her bump, just like JJ usually does before they go to sleep at night. “You okay in there?”

The baby kicks again, as if in reply. Kie wonders if it can hear her voice. JJ seems to think it can, based on all the stuff he’s read in that pregnancy book John B gave him once, which is why he insists on talking to her bump all the time. Remembering that makes her miss him all the more.

“You miss Daddy, huh?” Kie whispers again, feeling stupid but not really caring. “Me too.”

That night, Kie falls asleep thinking of the boy who stood on the front porch step, calling her name out into the rain, and how she had left him all alone.

* * *

Sarah Cameron, the best girl friend Kie has ever had, makes the trip down from Charleston to the Banks to spend some time with Kie and her broken heart. 

She arrives on Tuesday morning, four days after Kie had moved home, appearing on the doorstep with a duffel bag swung over her shoulder and a bright smile spread across her face.

Kie feels ten tons lighter when she opens the door to the girl and quickly steps forward to gather her into a hug. Her protruding bump makes the embrace a little clumsy, but Kie’s still able to tuck her chin into Sarah’s shoulder and whisper, “It’s good to see you.”

When Sarah pulls back from the hug, she’s still smiling, all white teeth and full lips. “Hey, Kie,” she says softly. Then, louder, calling over Kie’s shoulder to the adults who are standing behind them in the living room. “Hey, Mrs Carrera; Mr Carrera.” And finally, to the unborn kid in Kie’s belly, “Hello, baby. Your favourite aunt is here!”

Kie can’t help but smile at that. It’s the first real grin she’s worn in days. “Apparently, it can hear you. At least, that’s what JJ—” Kie stops herself, stomach dropping at the way she says his name so casually like that. Like her brain has forgotten what has happened. That she left him. That he’s not with her anymore. 

Sarah notices the fumble and raises an eyebrow but doesn’t say anything about it, then has the grace to change the subject. “I bought you these.” She pulls out an opened family-size packet of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos from her weekend bag and hands it to Kie. “I got hungry on the way down and thought you’d like ‘em,” Sarah shrugs. “I ate half the bag already. Sorry,” she grins cheekily.

The smile returns. “You suck,” Kie jokes, then tucks the bag under one arm and waves Sarah inside. She waits while Sarah gives her mom a hug and her dad a warm handshake, then says, “Wanna go outside on the porch?” They’re best friends. There’s no need for small talk and other pleasantries, even though they haven’t seen each other in weeks. They just pick up where they left off every time. 

It’s comforting to know that even in times of great change and confusion, some things — some people, some friendships — stay gloriously the same.

“Sure.” Sarah drops her bag in Kie’s room on the way down the hallway, then they’re opening the back door that leads to the section of the wraparound porch that houses Kie’s favourite old deckchairs. It’s the most peaceful place on the Carrera’s property, looking out onto the back garden and the creek that runs past their house out to the sea. Kie comes to sit out here all the time to watch the sunset or to practice her ukelele, as it’s far enough away from the main road that she can’t hear the sounds of cars driving by.

(She thinks, briefly, that JJ has never sat with her on this porch before. Perhaps that is something that needs to change.)

Seconds after the two of them settle down into the chairs, Kie reopens the bag of Cheetos and gets straight to eating. 

Sarah stares at her curiously, watching Kie eat. “Don’t you get, like, heartburn or acid reflux eating these?” she asks. “I read online that you’re supposed to avoid spicy foods when pregnant.”

Kie pauses her demolition of the crunchy snacks to shrug, “No, they don’t. Weirdly enough, it’s stuff with tomatoes in it that triggers the acid reflux stuff.” She licks the spicy red Cheeto dust off of her fingers and hands the bag over to Sarah, who takes a big handful. “I figured that one out pretty early on, around, like eleven weeks, when JJ made me a bowl of spaghetti...I was snorting tomato sauce out of my nose for the whole day afterwards.”

Kie smiles softly at the memory, even though it wasn’t a good experience at the time (like,  _ at all _ — she never wants to smell spaghetti sauce ever again). JJ had been such a help, then, holding back her hair as she vomited and massaged her shoulders as she lay cuddled up next to him on the couch. He had let her watch The Proposal, even though he hated it (“fake-marriage is a stupid TV cliche”, he’d said, which almost made her want to kick him out of the house right there and then, because how  _ dare _ he slander that masterpiece), because it was her comfort movie and made her feel better every time she watched it.

“That’s disgusting,” Sarah comments, pulling Kie back into reality once again.

“There is so much about pregnancy that is disgusting,” Kie chuckles. “But, hey, they say it’s worth it in the end, right?” she says sarcastically, pointing to her belly.

Sarah laughs. “Right.” Then, after a few minutes of eating in silence until the bag is almost finished, Sarah tentatively asks, “So, Kie...do you wanna…?”

Kie swallows her mouthful of crunched-up Cheetos and clears her throat. “Talk about it? Not really. But I guess I kinda need to.” She looks out over the garden — the tall, proud oak trees at the edge of the grass, the contrasting image of the smaller bushes that have lost their green for the year, preparing themselves for the coming winter. Kie wishes she could be like the oak trees: strong, steadfast, evergreen. Weathering every storm that comes her way.

Usually, she’d say that would be an accurate description of herself. But this particular storm? The baby, the life changes, the maybe-losing-JJ? This is something she’s struggling to fight against.

“I guess so,” says Sarah quietly. “Have you talked to your parents at all?”

Kie sighs. “A little. It’s— weird, though,” she says, scrunching up her nose and picking Cheeto dust out from under a fingernail. “I don’t feel super comfortable talking to them about stuff like this. Plus, it was their idea that I come back to live at home, so...it’s awkward. Mom’s trying her best to be kind. Dad is...trying too. I think he’s finding it hard that I’m not so excited to be here. It’s like he wants his little girl back, but I’m not that person anymore. I’m not thirteen, you know?” She looks over at her friend to find Sarah watching her with soft eyes. “I can’t be the kid they want,” Kie says, the honest truth sticking in her throat.

Sarah is silent for a long moment; a minute that stretches forever. “You know they love you, Kie,” she replies eventually, looking at her with those soft brown eyes. Kie’s heart clenches. It hurts to talk about this. “Even if they don’t quite understand.”

“I know,” Kie mumbles, ducking her head. “It’s still hard.”

“I get that,” Sarah says, and Kie knows that she does.

No one, not even JJ, has a more messed up family than Sarah Cameron. And no one understands the pain of resenting your family yet still intrinsically loving them as her.

“So, what happened between you and JJ?” Sarah says, quickly changing the subject. (Except  _ this  _ topic is one Kie wants to talk about even less.) “I thought everything was going great.”

Kie speaks through the lump that’s formed in her throat. “It  _ was. _ That’s the stupid thing. Everything was perfect.” She sighs and leans back into the chair, closing her eyes. Memories come to her, playing out like photographs behind her eyelids: walks with Fisher (she misses that silly dog), cooking dinner together, surfing at Rixon’s (while she still could), kissing JJ whenever she wanted for as long as she wanted. These past few months had all been so wonderful. Why did it have to change? (Why had she  _ forced _ it to?)

“And I think it was  _ because _ of that,” Kie continues, “that I— I don’t know. It felt too good to be true. Like maybe we were...just pretending that everything was cool when it wasn’t.” She opens her eyes, now, and looks over at the girl to her left. “I mean, we’re barely twenty fucking years old, Sarah. I don’t have a job. JJ is— JJ is trying, so hard, but—” She swallows, trying to avoid tears from escaping her eyes. “My dad came to see me. First time I’d talked to him in months. He asked me to come home to him and mom. And I— I said yes, because I thought it was the right thing to do. I thought I couldn’t do this with just JJ. Because what does he know about babies? What the fuck do I know?” She laughs humorlessly. “And then, when I told J...we had a huge fight. The worst, since ever. Said a lot of things that weren’t good. But I already kinda told you that, over the phone…” Kie trails off, remembering the call she’d made to Sarah early in the morning, the day after she’d come home. 

(There had been a fair amount of crying. Mostly on Sarah’s end, surprisingly, because she couldn’t believe that her “OTP forever” had potentially broken up. Kie tried to explain that they weren’t broken up, just taking some time away, but Sarah wanted none of it. It was during that phone call that she’d demanded Kie let her stay for a few days so they could talk it out.)

Sarah’s eyebrows furrow together and her mouth twists into a sad half-smile-half-frown. “I’m sorry, babe,” she says gently, reaching across the space between the deckchairs to take hold of Kie’s hand.

“I haven’t told you this yet, but…” Kie sighs. A sharp pain pricks at her chest. (She’s pretty sure it’s not heartburn from all the Cheetos.) “He said that he loved me. In the middle of the fight.”

“Oh, JJ…” Sarah breathes.

“And I didn’t say it back.”

“Oh, Kie…”

Then Sarah is rubbing her thumb along Kie’s knuckles, and Gremlin is stirring in her belly, and the painful memories of that night come rushing back all at once, and Kie can’t help the tears that fall.

“And I left him,” she says, frustratedly wiping away the tears in her eyes with her free hand. “I got out of there so fucking quick I didn’t even have time to pack a bag. I was just...gone. I should never have left him. I feel so fucking  _ guilty. _ I just— I have plans, you know,” Kie says, quieter than before. “I have dreams.” 

Sarah squeezes her hand, which forces Kie to look at her. Sarah’s face is a little blurry, seeing as Kie’s eyes are still clouded with stubborn tears, but she can read the expression on her friend’s face as clear as day: the head cocked slightly to the side, perfectly-shaped eyebrows raised, lips pursed, as if she was saying,  _ You’re an idiot, you know that? _

“And you don’t think JJ does too?” Sarah says. 

There’s nothing to say to that, really. Sarah is calling her out on one thing she’s struggled with all her life: her pride. Holding others to the same high standard as she does herself, then admonishing them for not doing enough. It’s not like she purposely tries to act like she’s better than anyone else --  _ especially _ not JJ. But sometimes, without even noticing, Kie’s pride hurts the people she loves most.

That’s what JJ had been angry with her about during their fight, wasn’t it? When she’d unintentionally insinuated that he wasn’t doing enough for her? That it was  _ she  _ who had the big dreams to travel the world and go on incredible adventures, not he? That he had resigned himself to a working-class life on the Cut forever, and that she resented him for it? She had meant  _ none _ of it, of course, but that wasn’t the issue. The issue was that JJ had interpreted her words that way, and that he really believed she meant what she had said. That was the thing that had broken her heart worst of all.

Kie goes to open her mouth to reply, but finds that no coherent words come out, just some vague mumbling that sounds like,  _ “I didn’t mean it like that.” _

Then Sarah pushes further. “There’s more to it, though, isn’t there?” she asks. “It’s not about your age, or whether or not you both have jobs, or how mature you are, or how ready you are to become parents.  _ Is it _ ?” Sarah emphasises the last sentence, leaning forward in her chair to rest her elbow on the arm of the chair, propping her chin up with one hand. Tendrils of her blonde hair fall around her face, catching the midday sun (weak as it is this time of year) and making it appear like she is wearing a halo or some kind of golden crown. She looks powerful and all-fucking-knowing.

That’s why Kie doesn’t bother to avoid the question, or make up some stupid lie, or pretend like she doesn’t understand what Sarah is asking. There’s no point. Sarah will know whether she’s being truthful or not. (Pope’s like that, too.)

Something unwinds inside her when she finally admits, in a shaky voice, “I’m scared.”

Sarah bites her lip, holding back a told-you-so smile. “Of what, babe?” she asks, treading carefully, like Kie’s an injured animal that needs to be talked to with hushed tones lest it’s frightened off.

The almost-winter sun is shining, and Kie’s sitting in her favourite chair, and her best girl friend is sitting right next to her, and she’s got a boatload of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos filling her belly, so what does she have to lose by telling the truth right now? By getting vulnerable? God knows Kie’s got herself into this fucking mess by not being honest with her feelings. “Of how much I care about him,” she quietly replies. “How badly I want this to work. I’ve never felt this way about  _ anyone _ . _ ”  _ Kie exhales a lungful of breath in one loud  _ whoosh _ and tips her head back to rest against the chair, turning ever so slightly to look Sarah in the eye.

Sarah smiles. “Kie, look,” she says softly, reaching out to grab a hold of Kie’s hand again. “Can I be real with you?”

“Are you ever not?” Kie chuckles as she raises an eyebrow, because Sarah’s always a straight-shooter. It’s why they get along so well.

Sarah laughs back and shakes her head. Her palm is warm against Kie’s. “As much as I love being your best friend,” she continues, “you can’t keep coming to me whenever stuff goes wrong between the two of you. You need to learn how to communicate with him. Not just  _ talking _ , but  _ understanding. _ He loves you so much.” She squeezes Kie’s hand once then drops it, reaching instead to fondly rest her hand on Kie’s cheek. “You have to trust him with the shit that goes on in your head. You have to let him in.”

Kie sighs into her touch. “I know,” she replies, closing her eyes for a moment. “It’s just— it’s so hard. I know that’s a cop out answer but  _ fuck.  _ It is.”

“I get that,” says Sarah. “But that’s—” she pulls her hand away again and straightens in her chair. “That’s what a relationship  _ is _ , Kie. It’s hard work. And you’re never gonna experience the fullness of a true, deep relationship with him if you never let yourself open up.”

Kiara thinks about how angry she’d been when John B had gotten together with Sarah the summer they chased the gold. At the time, she couldn’t think of anything worse than John B, one of her best friends, hooking up with someone she hated. And the fact that it was  _ Sarah Cameron _ , out of  _ all _ the Kooks he could have dated, had made it even more terrible. Plus, they were so PDA with each other (still are, although the rest of the Pogues have all gotten used to it now) that it was impossible for Kie to try and deny the existence of their relationship. 

Oh, how far they have come from those early days. Now, Kie admires John B and Sarah’s relationship as one that is healthy, wholesome and mature. They’ve been in love for many years, but Kie’s also seen the underside of that -- all the hard work that’s gone into their relationship. She had been there for Sarah when she and John B went through a particularly rocky patch a few years ago, around the same time that Rafe and Ward had been sentenced. She’s been on many a call with her friend as Sarah had complained about John B not pulling his weight around the house or spending too much time working and not enough with her.

Although they’re the same age, Kie  _ does _ look up to Sarah in some respects -- just as Sarah looks up to her. (Mutual admiration is an important part of friendship, Kie thinks.) And so Kie trusts Sarah when she gives advice on boys. Because Sarah’s been in a steady relationship for coming on four years, and Kie was platonically fucking her best friend, whom she is now pregnant by. Go figure.

“You’re right,” Kie replies with a groan. “ _ Fuck _ , I know you’re right. I guess I don’t know how to...express... _ things _ to him. Feelings. I don’t know. I’m not—” She shakes her head and sighs. It’s hard to articulate all this. “I’ve never had a problem with being up front about who I am before but— it feels so— it feels more—  _ fragile _ , somehow.” Fragile doesn’t seem to be quite the right word, but it’s as close as Kie can get to describing how this thing with JJ feels.

“Because I think you really, truly love him, Kie,” Sarah whispers tenderly. A lump sticks in Kie’s throat, tears pricking at her eyes again.  _ It’s true,  _ she thinks,  _ I love him, it’s true. _ “It feels more fragile because it  _ is.  _ It was easier when you were just friends, but now you’re having a baby together, and you’re in a relationship, and no—” Sarah raises her hand at Kie’s opening mouth, stopping her from protesting, “you  _ are _ in a relationship, whether or not you’ve defined it like that. It feels fragile because you care about him so much that you don’t want to ever break any part of him. You hold the love in your hands, and you’re scared if you hold it too tight it’s gonna shatter and smash and you’ll get blood all over everything and--” she pauses to take a breath. Kie just watches her, hanging on to her every word.  _ She’s right. She’s always fucking right. _ “You have to stop being afraid of falling in love, Kie, and embrace it with both arms open wide,” Sarah continues with a smile. “Your heart might get a little broken at some point. But, you know, you and JJ are pretty good at repairing broken things. You’ve gone through so much already. You can handle this. Being parents. Being  _ together. _ ”

There’s a long, long pause. It’s so quiet that Kie can hear the whistling of the wind through the leaves of the oaks tree in the garden, the creaking of their branches. The wind chills her, makes her shiver, her skin prickling -- but not just because of that wind, but because everything Sarah is saying is so brutally true that Kie’s body can’t help but physically react to it. 

With one big exhale, Kie says finally, “Fuck you, Sarah Cameron. I hate it when you’re right.”

Then tears are dripping silently down the length of Kie’s nose, and Sarah is saying,  _ “hey, hey, it’s okay, babe, really,” _ and reaching over to wipe away the droplets with the corner of her sleeve, and then Kie finds herself tucked into Sarah’s shoulder, wrapped in a warm hug that seems to last forever.

Later, while the two of them drink berry smoothies that Kie’s mom had made for them as a lunchtime treat and watch a little yellow goldfinch flit across the lower branches of one of the oak trees, Sarah turns to Kie and asks one important question.

“Are you in love with him?” she asks, and Kie’s reminded of a similar conversation the two of them had had when they found out Kie was pregnant, where they’d laid on Kie’s bed and Sarah had asked  _ do you like him? _

This time, she doesn’t say  _ I don’t want to _ or  _ I don’t know _ . 

She stares out at those oak trees, thinks  _ I am strong, I am steadfast, I am evergreen, _ and says, finally, resolutely: “Yes.”

* * *

JJ’s never really been a crier. An angry crier, maybe, like that time he almost fucking killed his dad after a fight, with blood in his mouth and a spanner in hand, ready to strike. But never a sad crier.

Not even in movies.

JJ cries the morning of the fourth day that Kie is gone. That’s, strangely, when it hits him: that Kie has left him, and he doesn’t know when she’ll be back.

He had called both Pope and John B early on the morning after Kie left, but neither conversation had been especially comforting for him. He’d been unable to process his feelings over what had happened the night before, never getting further than  _ Kie left and I don’t know what to do. _

Both of them had made offers to come back down to the Banks to visit for a while, but JJ had declined twice. He hadn’t wanted to waste their time, because he was a big kid and used to being alone and besides, Kie was going to come back soon, right? Surely by Sunday, at the latest. John B and Pope had both agreed.

_ “She loves you, man,” _ John B had said.  _ “There’s no way she’ll be gone for long.” _

But now it’s day four and he’s heard nothing from Kie at all, although he knows from John B that Sarah had come down to visit her this week. And so, waking up stressed and sad on the morning of this fourth-day-without-Kiara, he calls Pope again.

Pope picks up on the second ring. “What’s up, man?”

“I’m in love with Kie,” JJ blurts out, not bothering with any kind of  _ hi _ or  _ how are you? _ He and Pope surpassed the need for formalities when talking to one another years and years ago. They’re much too close for that now.

Without so much as a pause, Pope replies, “Yeah? And?”

“What do you mean?” JJ asks, scratching the top of his head as he paces around the living room of the Chateau. Fisher follows his tracks, his wet nose brushing against JJ sweatpant-clad legs every so often. He reaches down to ruffle the dog’s fur while still keeping the phone pressed to his ear.

“Well it’s not exactly a surprise, is it?” Pope chuckles. “We’ve all known it for a while. I think you have too.”

JJ flops down on the couch and tips his head back to stare up at the ceiling. Fisher jumps up next to him and rests his furry head on JJ’s lap. (The dog’s been doing this more than usual this week. Maybe it’s true that dogs can sense human emotions. JJ’s definitely been giving major sad vibes these past few days.) “How do you always—  _ know _ things, Pope?” he groans. “Like, you always know what’s going on in my head before I even say anything.”

“What can I say? It’s a gift,” Pope says, then laughs. “No, I’m just very observant. I listen. And not just to words spoken, you know. You’ve been saying that you love Kie for a long time, without even saying it out loud.”

JJ has no idea what that really means, but it  _ feels _ like it might be true. “Fuck, you should be a poet,” he breathes. Then, “But what do you mean by that?”

“I don’t know,” Pope replies. “I guess it’s just...the way you are with her. I can tell you really care about her.”

Yeah, Pope’s definitely right about that. This whole life-without-Kiara thing is killing him slowly from the inside out. 

Friendships and relationships are funny things. In the span of just over one year Kie’s gone from his girl best friend that he always kind of had an underlying thing for, to his girl best friend that he was casually fucking because they were lonely and bored and it was fun, to the mother of his unborn child and the love of his mother _ fucking _ life. 

He’s had a few days to process these feelings now, after months and months of  _ I-think-it’s-like  _ and  _ maybe-it’s-just _ and  _ she-won’t-feel-the-same: _ the night she left, when he slept alone on the couch, confirmed it. 

JJ Maybank is in love with Kiara Carrera. Like, big  _ fucking _ time. 

“I do,” he admits to Pope. “ _ Shit, _ ” he sighs, “should I call her?” Is that what she wants him to do? It is, right? How else is he supposed to get in contact with her, anyway? He can’t just rock on up to her front door. That would be weird.

But then Pope says, “No,” and JJ raises his eyebrows.

“No?”

“No. Let her come to you,” Pope continues. “You have to give her time. That’s what she asked for, right?”

JJ exhales loudly. Fisher stirs in his lap, looking up at him with one raised ear. JJ shakes his head as if to say  _ I’m alright, buddy _ and the dog rests his head back down on JJ’s thighs. “Right. God, I miss you, dude. How’s Sofie?” 

He can practically  _ hear _ Pope’s smile through the phone. He knows exactly what Pope’s gonna say even before he says it:  _ she’s amazing, she’s so smart and pretty, she’s studying Forensic Science too and doesn’t think it’s weird that I wanna poke dead bodies for the rest of my life, blah blah blah. _ They’re sickeningly sweet and JJ loves it. Pope deserves to be loved by good people. Sofie, the leggy (and smart, apparently) brunette from Louisiana with a kind smile is most definitely good people, as far as JJ is concerned. 

As expected, Pope gushes over his new girlfriend. “She’s good. She’s  _ great. _ You guys should come down to see us. You know, when everything is—”

“When everything’s cool with Kie again,” JJ sighs, finishing his friend’s sentence. “I wish I was as optimistic as you are about it.”

Pope is quiet for a moment, thinking. JJ stares up at the ceiling again, watches the morning sunlight dance across the wood, catching on spiderwebs. (He should probably clean those up before Kiara gets home, huh? She doesn’t like spiders much. And she  _ is _ coming home. Right?) “She loves you, JJ,” says Pope softly. “No doubt about it. Even if she didn’t say it back.”

JJ’s memory flits back to the other night, to the look on Kie’s face when he’d blurted it out.  _ And I fucking love you, okay? _ he’d shouted, and her lips had set into a straight line, and rivulets of tears had trailed down her cheeks, and he’d felt his stomach drop to the floor as he quickly realised she wasn’t going to say  _ I love you _ back.

“It was so fucking  _ embarrassing _ , Pope,” JJ groans, squeezing his eyes shut, as if that would ward off those awkward, painful memories. “I just stood there, confessing my fucking love for her, and she said:  _ you can’t say that to me. _ What the fuck does that even mean?”

Ever wise, Pope replies in a measured tone, “It means you were in the middle of a huge fight and she felt like you were telling her you loved her in an attempt to get her to stay?”

JJ mulls his friend’s words over in his mind. Had that been how the confession had come across? He certainly hadn’t meant it to at all. “You really think she felt that way?”

“I mean, I would, in that situation. Kind of a shitty way to say it, dude. A little unfair, don’t you think?”

Okay, so maybe springing it on her like that wasn’t the best way to go about things. He guesses he’d be kind of pissed off, too, if it had been the other way around.

Chastised, JJ replies, “I didn’t mean to say it…it just came out. Couldn’t help it.” He shrugs, even though Pope can’t see him. 

Pope’s voice is soothing and calm. “Look, JJ, regardless of whether she said it back that night or not, I  _ know _ she loves you. The way she looks at you, talks about you: it’s undeniable. Give her time. She’ll come around. And you’ll be just fine. And then you can come visit me and Sof in Florida,” he finishes lightly.

JJ’s not quite used to this dynamic: Pope is usually the pessimist and JJ the optimist. He decides it’s kind of nice, for a change. 

“Uh huh,” JJ says, still not entirely convinced that everything will work out with Kie like Pope says it will. It’s all so fucking complicated. Tired of talking about his feelings (he’s getting better at it but it’s still at the bottom of the list of his favourite things to do), JJ asks, “So, what are you doing today?”

“Nice change of subject, JJ. Very smooth,” Pope chuckles. “Well, I’m studying for a twenty-percent test that I’m taking next Monday, and Sofie is coming over to help me…”

JJ smiles, enjoying being the listener for once. And so the conversation continues on like that: JJ listening to the sound of Pope’s warm voice as he details his plans for the coming week, Fisher a heavy weight on his lap, with thoughts of Kie and the baby pushed to the back of his mind. 

(Just for a moment.)

* * *

Sarah goes back to Charleston after a few days at the Banks, leaving Kie with a kiss on her forehead and a  _ I know you two will work things out, babe, I just know it. _

(Kie wishes she had that same hope, because how can she take back the words she said to him? How can she reverse the hurt on both sides? All questions she asks herself every night while laying in bed, staring at the ceiling, feeling Gremlin move in her belly.)

The whole point of this break was for Kie to slow down and to think critically and deeply about who she is, what she wants out of life, and where she stands in her relationship with JJ. And so she spends her time after Sarah leaves going for walks down at the beach (she’s too sore and slow to walk for long anymore, so these adventures usually result in Kie just sitting in her truck and staring at the waves, longing for the day when she can be out surfing again) and on her own in her room, scribbling notes in an old journal she found under her bed, things like:  _ future goals?? _ or  _ pros and cons of dating JJ for real _ . 

She listens to wellness podcasts and reads half of a “advice for new moms” book her mom gave her, and reads a shit ton of shitty poetry (that reminds her of John B’s, honestly) she found on the internet. None of it really helps. Just makes her miss JJ even more, and feel stupid for crying over ‘Someone Like You’ by Adele, also known as the most stereotypical break up song ever. (It’s the hormones, okay?) Kie has to keep reminding herself that they’re not  _ really  _ broken up, but, still.

The only good and practical piece of advice she finds is from an inspirational YouTube video aptly titled (but admittedly cringey) ‘How to Get Back Together With An Ex Who Wasn’t Really Your Ex’, sent to her by Sarah along with the message:  _ I promise this is better than it looks! _

(Kie must really trust Sarah, because the video certainly looked extremely C-grade, but she had pressed play anyway.)

The advice was this: if you break up with someone for the sole reason that you need to  _ find yourself, _ you’re never going to actually achieve that goal. That’s because it’s  _ not _ a goal. Like happiness or love or success, it’s not something that can be measured. ‘Finding yourself’ and ‘figuring out your place in the world’ does not happen as a singular event, some kind of  _ ‘oh, I understand now!’ _ sort of epiphany brought on by the realisation that you’d rather start a research and rehabilitation facility for endangered sea turtles than work in your dad’s restaurant your whole life (which  _ has  _ certainly been part of Kie’s discovery over the past few days, and something she’d like to put more thought to in the future.)

Figuring out who you are and how you fit takes place over an entire lifetime. You are always learning and growing, falling down and getting back up, losing old friends and old goals and old hobbies and finding new ones. Everything changes all the time. You have to realise that one person is not going to make you happy, but the closest you’ll get to feeling fulfilled in a relationship with another human being happens when you learn how to grow and change both outside  _ and _ inside a relationship. 

Basically, Kie understands, you can’t break up with someone every time you get scared of the future or feel like you don’t know exactly who you are. Being in a relationship doesn’t solve those issues as much as being on your own doesn’t either.

She watches this stupid, cringey YouTue video and gets it. She really, honestly does. Because it’s only been just over a week that she’s been alone, but she’s so fucking lonely, and she doesn’t love JJ any less or understand herself any more. 

Except for this: that she needs to learn how to trust that JJ will still love and care for her when her interests change, when her levels of affection for him inevitably rise and fall like the tides (because if it’s one thing she’s learnt from watching her parents marriage from the sidelines growing up it’s that love is not a feeling, but a choice that you make every day), when he’s exhausted and confused and worried about becoming a new mom, or when the baby comes, and their relationship changes yet again. She needs to learn these things while being  _ with _ him, not apart. 

There is so much she has yet to figure out about who she is and what she wants out of life. One thing stays the same: Kiara is in love with JJ, and she needs to be with him. The father of her unborn child. Her best friend in the world.

She has to go back home.

And by that, she means the Chateau. Wherever JJ is, really. The Carrera household was home once, and although she’s actually somewhat enjoyed the past week or so living here and talking with her parents and sleeping in her old bed, it’s not anymore.

Kie decides to tell her mom as much one evening, two days out from Thanksgiving. Her dad is out in the back garden cooking steak on the barbecue (even though it’s getting to the colder side of an Outer Banks November with a sharp chill in the air), while Kie and her mom sit reading on the couches in the living room. Reading in silence together has been something they’ve been doing a lot lately. Kie finds that she likes it. She’s always struggled to get along with her mom, but she likes hanging out with her like this: enjoying being in each other’s presence without having to say a word. Her mom will punctuate the silence on occasion with questions about the book Kie’s reading, or about whether she needs a heat pack for her lower back or a cool drink of milk to soothe the acid reflux that gets to her sometimes (thanks a lot, Gremlin). Otherwise, it’s peaceful and quiet in the living room.

After re-reading the same sentence on afterbirth (of all things) six times over, her mind stuck on JJ and not the details of giving birth, Kie takes a deep breath, puts her book down, and says out into the silent room, “I think I need to go back, Mom.”

Her mom looks at her over the edge of her book. “What do you mean?” she asks, peering at her through her reading glasses with a furrowed brow, although the tone of her voice is less questioning and more soothing, leading Kie to think that her mom knows what is really going on.

Suddenly, all the emotions from the last few days come crashing down on Kie at once. “I gotta go back to him, Mom,” she says, voice breaking. “I can’t— I can’t do this without him.” And then tears are leaking out of her eyes without permission, and her mom is inching closer to her on the sofa and resting a hand on her shoulder in comfort.

“I know,” her mom says softly. Kie doesn’t know what to make of this. When her dad had come to visit her at the Chateau that one afternoon, he’d made it seem like her mom was desperate to have her home, that she couldn’t live without her, or some shit like that. Why, after Kie’s only been home for a handful of days and is now saying she wants to leave again, is she being so chill about it all?

“You know?” Kie whispers, looking down at her feet. (Which is a feat in itself, because her stomach is getting so big she can barely see the ground underneath her anymore.) 

Her mom takes her hand off Kie’s shoulder and shifts back into the couch cushion. Kie spares a glance her way, and finds that her mom is looking at her with a gentle expression. She’s not used to seeing that kind of look. It sort of unnerves her. “Your dad and I had a feeling that it was a mistake asking you to come home. Right from the first night you were here. But we didn’t want to push you,” her mom says with a smile. “It seems like you really care about him, Kiara. And you’re going to be parents. You need to learn how to do life together, the good  _ and _ the bad.” Then she is reaching out again to squeeze her shoulder and to say, “As much as I’d hoped that you staying here would help...repair some of the damage that was done between us... I think it’s better if you’re with him instead.”

_ Repair some of the damage. _ God, that breaks her fucking heart. Because there  _ is  _ damage. There’s years of hurt and grudges that stick and painful memories of feeling like she’s never made her mother proud, never been the daughter she wanted. “Mom…” Kie whispers, tearing up again.

Now her mom’s eyes are growing wet with tears, too. “We haven’t always seen eye to eye, sweetheart,” she admits with a wavering voice. “You’ve always been a dad’s girl, through and through. But that doesn’t mean I want to see you hurt. That’s the—” she sniffles and wipes the corner of her eye with one of her sleeves, “that’s the  _ furthest _ thing from what I want. I want to see you joyful, and safe, and comfortable in who you are. I want to see you with someone who loves you.” She leans forward to tuck a lock of curly hair behind Kie’s ear, like she used to do all the time when Kie was a kid and would ruin her perfect braids by running around outside in the garden all day. “You’re going to be a fantastic mom, honey. I know it. And although I still don’t know JJ so well, I know he’ll be a great dad. I, for one, am very excited to become a grandmother. Although you gotta find a cool name for me, because I am  _ not _ becoming a ‘Grandma.’ I’m too young for that, alright?” she chuckles.

Kie doesn’t know what to say. Apart from the smattering of short conversations they’ve had about how Kie’s feeling with the baby this week, this is probably the first time ever that she’s had a proper, soul-baring conversation with her mother. It doesn’t quite erase the years of hurt, but it dulls the edges a little bit. Maybe Kie has some more growing to do, too. 

“Sure,” she says finally, because nothing else comes to mind, and she’s still trying not to burst into full-blown tears so she doesn’t want to say too much. Then, on impulse, because it feels right, “I love you, Mom. Really.”

The smile that lights up her mom’s face is brighter than the sun’s rays that reflect off the water at Rixon’s on a clear summer’s day. She leans in to press a kiss to Kie’s cheek, which is the closest thing to  _ I love you _ her mom gets without saying the words. “Your dad’s got dinner ready I think. Let’s go eat,” she says, standing up from the couch. “Oh, and Kiara?”

“Yeah?”

“You should invite JJ for Thanksgiving dinner. He’s a part of the family now.” She throws the words over her shoulder as she walks away, flippantly, casually, like it’s not the grandest gesture Kie’s mom’s ever extended to her, like it’s not the first time she’s ever expressed any interest in getting to know her friends. Let alone calling JJ one of the  _ family. _

It’s everything she’s ever hoped for. Her heart aches with the importance of such a thing, the weight.

Kie, speechless, just nods.

* * *

Taking the apprenticeship at Joe’s Auto Shop has certainly been one of the better decisions JJ has made since graduating high school (of which he achieved by the skin of his teeth, barely scraping through with just twenty-four credits to his name).

It’s a good job. He likes working with his hands, having fixed cars and boats and bikes since he was a kid. The work makes sense to him: he takes something broken, makes it whole again through step-by-step problem solving processes. His boss, Joe, is nice enough; an old ex-fisherman who’s a little rough around the edges, but pays JJ on time every week and lets him bring Fisher into the workshop sometimes to hang out with the other mechanics. 

JJ likes that he gets to talk to and work with people a lot, too. He’s good at charming the old ladies who come in to get their mobility scooters repaired and the Kook moms who are in getting sparkly new paint jobs on their G-Wagons. And he’s got enough genuine practical skill that the staunch (and, frankly, misogynist) old fishermen and bikers that are regulars at the shop admire his work and trust him when he says,  _ I don’t know what to tell ya, Nicky, but this ain’t gonna be a one-day fix; three days, tops _ instead of grumbling about how old Joe is trying to steal all their money by keeping their bike or boat in longer than it needs to.

The one bad thing about working with people, though, is that sometimes people come into the shop that he  _ doesn’t _ want to see. Namely: his estranged father.

It’s not like it’s happened loads of times before -- only once since he left home -- but the fact that it’s happened even  _ one time _ is weird. Is Luke Maybank making a point to call in to his son’s work? Is it a power or dominance kind of thing or some kind of scare tactic? JJ’s got no idea. He just knows that he’d rather not see his dad at his place of work, thanks.

Which is unfortunately exactly what happens one afternoon, eight days after Kie had left him, except it’s not in the way he expects.

JJ’s working quietly on the motor of an old Ford F-150 (his personal favourite kind of truck and one he’d like to own someday -- he’d once thought about buying one with his gold money, but thought he’d better save it, and now he’s got a kid to worry about, so…) when he hears his last name spoken clear as day. It’s preceded by a ‘Mister’, so JJ knows no one who works in the shop is addressing him. He looks up from his tools to find his father, of all people, talking to the receptionist at the front desk across the way.

Luke looks a little different than when JJ last saw him. Not massively, just enough for someone like him (someone like his  _ son _ ) to notice. He’s lost some weight. Even from this far across the shop, JJ can see that his t-shirt fits looser than it used to and that he’s lost some of the fat on his neck. He looks...less mean, too, talking casually to the receptionist, one forearm resting on the counter and his other hand tucked into his back jean pocket. Other than the time Luke came into the shop months ago, the last time he’d seen his father was when he’d kicked him out of the house and beat him blue once he realised the Phantom was gone forever. It’s strange to see his dad so relaxed, acting like a normal fucking person.

Then Luke is moving his head, just slightly, and his eyes connect with JJ’s. JJ is not quick enough to avert his gaze. They stare at one another for two seconds before JJ looks away.

He tries to make himself look busy by getting back to his tools, but then he hears heavy footsteps walking deliberately toward him, and his stomach sinks to his knees. They’re in a public place and Luke Maybank wouldn’t dare but JJ’s mind still beats to the tune of  _ pleasedon’thitmepleasedon’thitmepleasedon’t-- _

“Son.”

JJ looks up at his dad’s unsmiling face, lips pulled together tightly into a grimace. JJ’s face matches his.

“Luke,” he says, just as sharp as his father’s greeting.

Luke shoves both hands into his front pockets. He rocks a little on his heels, like he’s uncomfortable. JJ wants to curl up into a ball and roll on out of here. “I hear that Carrera kid is pregnant,” his father says, straight to the point.

JJ pretends like he’s not taken aback by the statement and straightens up to look his father in the eyes. “Yep.” 

“Is it yours?” 

“Yep.”  _ And what are you gonna do about it? _ is the unspoken challenge. It drowns out that constant  _ pleasedon’thitme  _ because, what’s Luke gonna do? Throw a punch in the middle of the auto shop while JJ’s still got a spanner held tightly in his hand? One swing of that to Luke’s temple and he’s a goner, especially with the way his dad’s looking right now, all gaunt and sickly. No, there’ll be no fighting here. Not physically, at least.

He watches as his father’s eyes widen with surprise for a fraction of a second, then settle back into their usual glare, although it’s less murderous than normal. It’s almost...sad. JJ doesn’t really know what to do with that. Luke pauses, seemingly taking the information in, mulling it over. “Are you doing the right thing?” he asks gruffly after a few long moments.

JJ lifts his chin, steeling his jaw. “I am.” He tucks his greased-up spanner into the front pocket of his greased-up overalls and crosses his arms over his chest, making himself look bigger than he really is. 

He  _ is _ doing the right thing. He’s doing the right thing by sticking with Kie, staying loyal to her, taking care of her, respecting her boundaries when she says she needs space. He’s gonna be the best fucking dad the Outer Banks and the godforfuckingsaken Maybank family has ever seen. He’s going to make his kid proud to be a Maybank, no thanks to the shitstain of a father who stands in front of him right now.

_ Father _ , he thinks as he stares daggers at Luke.  _ You barely deserve the title. Me? I’m going to fucking  _ earn  _ it. _

Then comes the thing that JJ doesn’t expect. The thing that catches him way off guard. Instead of replying with some snarky comment or threatening him or getting physical with him in the middle of this garage, Luke just says, “Good.” 

There’s something in his father’s eyes, then. Something strangely heartbreaking. They go all soft. The blue in them goes from steel to water. He sighs. Then he’s reaching out to rest his hand on JJ’s shoulder, and JJ is flinching away from him -- fourteen years of habit, you see -- and the way Luke looks at him when he does so...the way he drops his hand and repeats himself, saying, “Good,” with that sad, sad look in his eyes…

JJ doesn’t think he’ll ever forget what his father did to him. Maybe he can learn to forgive; give him a half-decade’s worth of more therapy sessions and that could theoretically happen. But he’ll never forget the pain -- physically and psychological and  _ I’ve never understood what love really means because of you, you know that, right? _ \-- that was brought into his life by this sad old man. 

So why is he feeling so emotional while looking at the tears in his father’s eyes at this moment? Why does he feel  _ bad  _ for him? The man has given him nothing but hurt all his life. 

Luke Maybank gave up the right to a family the first time he ever hit his son hard enough to break his skin. JJ’s son or daughter will never call him  _ Grandpa _ . He will never take his grandchild for walks on the beach, or out for icecream, or read to them by the fire on Christmas Eves coming. JJ decided that the second he found out Kie was pregnant.

Tell him, then: why does he now feel sorry for this pitiful creature?

There are so many things JJ wants to say to his father right now. Things like  _ you’re pathetic, you know that? _ and  _ you don’t get to talk to me about fatherhood  _ and  _ you’ll never see the baby, not once. _

But then the receptionist is calling, “Mr. Maybank?” and his father is turning around and clearing his throat and replying, “Coming!” and, with one last searching look at his son’s face, he and his heavy bootsteps are retreating from him, hands in pockets, brokenhearted and deserving of it.

JJ watches him leave and feels something die inside his chest. He fucking hates himself for it.

* * *

JJ doesn’t realise that he’d been crying while driving until he pulls into the driveway of the Chateau and notices that his nose is dripping tiny puddles on the seat of his pants. He furiously wipes them away, angry at himself for sparing any kind of emotion on the man that once dared to call himself his  _ father _ , and stalks inside the house.

He’s on edge. From that surprise visit by his father and the fact that he hasn’t slept a full night since Kiara left. And you know what takes the edge off? Smoking.

It takes him a few minutes to decide whether or not he goes ahead with it. He’d quit smoking weed when he found out Kie was pregnant, deciding that he wanted to be a better role model for the kid and that it would probably be better if a newborn didn’t live with a smoker (even if it was just weed). But fuck it, you know? Kie’s not here. Who knows when she’ll be back. He’s right on the verge of having another panic attack if he doesn’t do something  _ now. _

And so JJ digs under his bed to find the small red toolbox where he keeps all his weed and makes himself a joint. His hands shake as he rolls it. He’s reminded of the last time he saw his dad, way back when he first found out Kie was pregnant, and how he’d spent half an hour on the phone to her as she pulled him from the precipice of a panic attack. 

As he falls into the familiar rhythm of rolling a joint, his mind drifts away from the difficulties with his father and on to Kie. He thinks of all the things he’s missing out on with her being  _ there _ and him being  _ here. _ It’s been barely over a week but it feels like it’s been ten lifetimes since he last saw her, last kissed her. Gremlin can’t have grown much in the past week, but still, there are other things to worry about. 

Like: is she remembering to take her prenatal vitamins? JJ was always the one who reminded her to take them in the mornings. 

Or how Kie had been getting heartburn more frequently in the last month or so — how that had kept her up at night, unable to sleep, a perpetually-full bladder not helping the situation either, as she had to get up at least five times a night to pee. (JJ remembers getting mildly annoyed at being woken up in the darkness by Kie shuffling out of bed. Now, he’d give his left nut to feel her stirring beside him again.) 

He also remembers that she’d been having cravings for homemade lemonade made from fresh-squeezed lemons they got specially from Pope’s dad’s place (and  _ only _ Mr Heyward’s lemons because  _ they taste so much better than anything at the supermarket _ , according to Kie) with sprigs of wild rosemary they found in the weeds behind the Chateau. He wonders if they have rosemary at the Carrera’s place, or if they use the right kind of lemons.  _ Maybe it doesn’t even matter, _ he thinks with a frown as he licks the edge of the rolling paper and packs down the end of the joint.  _ Maybe she doesn’t like lemonade anymore. _ Who knows. Pregnancy is weird. 

But weird as it is, he’s loved almost every moment of looking after and living with a pregnant Kie, watching her body change as their baby grows inside her, living together as some kind of mish-mash family. 

He takes himself and his joint out to the front yard and sits down in one of the hammocks, braving the cold of the November-evening wind. It takes him three tries of flicking his thumb over the flint to get his lighter to produce a flame. He uses it to light the tip of his joint, then takes one long drag. 

Kie’s gone. He doesn’t know when she’s coming back. He wants to be like Pope — optimistic, hopeful — but he feels impossibly heavy. And his father -- why had he come in today? To torture him? How did he think that would make him feel? How can he pick himself up?

He loves her. He wants to start a new family with her. That’s it. That’s all there is to it. What is he supposed to do?

He stays out in the hammock until long after the sun has set and the weed is gone, thinking of a girl with sable-coloured hair and invisible angel wings, hoping that she’ll make her way back to him sometime soon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you all for the AMazing response to the last chapter !! i had that fight planned out for a while but was nervous to actually write bc i didn't want it to seem out of character. i'm so happy you all liked it tho (and sorry not really sorry to those who said i made them cry hehehe). i love all ya'll so much and i'm so grateful to have such wonderful readers!!
> 
> this made me sad to write and i'm sorry if it makes you sad too, but like i said at the beginning, i PROMISE good things are ahead!! (spoiler alert: next chapter is the thanksgiving chapter (which might actually line up with the real holiday at the snails pace i'm writing these lol). there's a reunion. it's a goodie.)


	16. homecoming

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hooooo boy! here we go! the chapter you've all been waiting for.........jj and kie's Emotional Reunion !!!
> 
> i really enjoyed writing this chapter - fluff and all - so i hope you all enjoy xoxo
> 
> the songs for this chapter are: ‘i know the end’ - phoebe bridgers; ‘we are fine’ - sharon van etten; ‘x & y’ - coldplay; ‘deep in love’ - bonny light horseman. check them out on my dedicated spotify playlist hehehe: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3DpMrxkuDIReLiNIyBXBV1?si=iFpyVgL8SLOPkvI07YAUjA

It’s Thanksgiving, and JJ’s going to spend it all alone.

Which is fine, really, because it’s not like he ever celebrated the holiday with his dad. With his mom, once, yeah. But she’s gone now. Has been for a long time.

Being alone on the holidays is nothing new. 

(Doesn’t mean it still doesn’t hurt.)

Kiara has been gone for ten days, which isn’t long in the scheme of things, but feels like fucking  _ forever. _

He misses her like fucking crazy, especially since he’s realised he’s head over heels in love with the girl. And he’s still feeling weirded out by that conversation with his dad at the garage, made even worse by the fact that it’s Thanksgiving and he tends to think a lot of thoughts about family at Thanksgiving. Like how his mom left him when he was a kid; like how his dad’s a piece of shit; like how he never had a normal, vanilla, completely-un-fucked-up childhood. Real fun stuff.

John B calls to check in on him that Thursday morning, wishing him a happy Thanksgiving and reminding him that it’s not too late for JJ to come join them in Charleston for the holiday. JJ respectfully declines his offer again but wishes John B and Sarah well, promising that he’ll be fine on his own. He tells this to Pope, too, when the boy calls him and asks him if he’s okay, if he’s fine with his choice to stay in the Banks for the long weekend.  _ Don’t worry about me,  _ he insists. 

Because he  _ is _ fine. He always is. Even if the past ten days of drinking more than usual and not sleeping and taking up smoking again (the dumbest decision of the lot, because Kie’s seven months along and he  _ really _ doesn’t have the time to kick the habit again before the baby’s born) have proved otherwise. 

He’s okay. He  _ promises. _

(JJ often wonders who, exactly, he’s promising this to.)

It’s almost midday and after a nice, long morning of moping around the house, Fisher following at his heels like a literal lost puppy, JJ crashes on the couch with a bottle of warm beer and a bowl of leftover spaghetti from last night’s dinner. He turns on the television and watches the livestream of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade. Stares at the giant balloons and all the little dancing people celebrating this joke of a holiday (which has a terrible history, too — Kie had taught him all about that). Feels sorry for himself. Drinks the whole bottle of beer. Listens to the rain falling outside.

Right when the huge Spongebob Squarepants balloon starts making its way through Midtown Manhattan, there’s a loud knock on the door. Fisher sniffs the air, barks, then scrambles to the front door, paws skidding across the wooden floor. He scratches at the door, yelping excitedly at the person behind it, and JJ stumbles over, opening it in confusion, because Fisher only ever does that when it’s— “Kie?”

She’s here.

She’s  _ here. _

His brain short-circuits. He can’t do anything but look at her, can’t think anything else but  _ she’s here! _ Here, with her long curls, damp from the rain, tucked behind her ears, wearing a checkered dress that rides up a little in the front — too small for her baby bump, clearly — and an old sweater over top (is it one of his? he thinks it might be). A blush creeps through her dark olive skin, her mouth opens into a small ‘o’. She is beautiful. All the muscles in his body pull tight with tension, with the effort he’s making not to reach out and sweep her up into his arms.

He can’t do that. Because they fought. Because they’re not together. Because. Because.  _ Because _ .

“JJ?” she breathes, like she’s surprised he opened the door. He flushes under her gaze, at her eyes flitting over his face and body: his under-eye bags, the empty bottle in his hand, his hair that sticks up from all angles, the ratty Kildare County sweatshirt-and-sweatpants combo he wears.

“Hi,” he replies dumbly, because he can’t think of anything else to say.  _ She’s here. Kie’s here. _

_ Why is she here? _

He’s pretty sure there’d been no phone call, or text, or Instagram DM to let him know she wanted to talk.

But, then again, showing up unannounced at his house in the rain seems to be Kie’s thing. If he had a nickel for every time that had happened, he’d have...two nickels. But still, it’s weird that it’s happened twice. It’s not like he’s living in some romance novel or something.

“Hi,” she echoes, mouth still slightly open with that bewildered look she has that is  _ so _ unlike Kie, because she’s always sure of herself, never surprised. “It’s Thanksgiving,” she blurts out, that redness in her cheeks glowing brighter.

He clears his throat. “It is.” JJ cocks his head to the side, confused.  _ What is she getting at? _

Kie shifts her weight to her left hip, then winces and places her hand on her belly.  _ Is Gremlin kicking? Is she in pain?  _ God, her bump has grown, even in only ten days. “You should come over,” she says awkwardly. “To my parents’ house. For Thanksgiving.”

A nervous kind of warmth floods his body, flowing from his head to his gut to his feet. “Oh,” he says, wide-eyed, still confused. Does this mean they’re okay again? He feels like they should be saying more than this. But still, an invite to the Carrera’s Thanksgiving. That surely means something good.

“We have turkey,” she says by way of explanation.

“Uh huh,” he nods.  _ What is she doing? Why is she here? _

There’s a beat where neither of them say anything, just stare at each other with wide eyes. Then, Kie is exhaling a long breath, like she’d been holding it in her lungs for hours, and says, “I shouldn’t have left. I’m sorry.”

_ Ah. _ So that’s what this is. An apology. An attempt to repair the damage. His heart swells.

But she’s not to blame. Or, at least, not entirely. It was the two of them, being stupid, not knowing how to communicate their feelings. She doesn’t have to be sorry. “You did what you had to do,” JJ says, ducking down to place the empty beer bottle just inside the front door. He straightens and shoves his hands into the pocket of his sweatpants. “You don’t have to apologise.” He then steps back and waves her into the house and out of the rain. She follows wordlessly.

He shuts the door and turns back to her, watching as Kie’s eyebrows knit together as she looks up at him, nearly only a few inches from him now, her bump taking up most of the free space between them in the narrow hallway. She swallows. “I do,” she says. “I was an asshole, and I’m sorry.”

JJ’s heart sticks in his throat. “I’m sorry, too,” he echoes, his voice falling to a whisper. God, she’s so close. So close he can smell the rain in her hair and the coconut lotion she smears over her body every morning. “For all the shit I said when I was angry.” And he means it, because there  _ was _ a lot of shit he said that he hadn’t meant to say. And maybe it was shit that  _ needed _ to be said, but most definitely not while he’d been so angry like that. When JJ got angry, all he did was hurt others. He never wants to get that angry with Kie ever again.

“It’s okay. I deserved it.” Her lips curve into a watery, self-deprecating smile. 

He sighs. “Kiara—”

She shakes her head. “No, I wanna talk about my feelings for once in my  _ fucking  _ life,” she says, brown eyes ablaze, jaw set. He’d take a step back, out of her firing range, if he could, but the wall is right behind him. “I shouldn’t have left, JJ,” she hisses angrily, although she sounds mad at herself, not him, which is a relief. He doesn’t think he could have handled it if she’d come here just to yell at him again. “I should never have fucking left. I can’t— I can’t always keep running away when things get rough. When I get scared. I— I can’t do  _ any  _ of this without you. And I don’t wanna be  _ afraid  _ anymore. I’m sick of it.” There are tears in her eyes. Her breath is hot in the air between them.  _ She’s so close. _ “I just want you, J. All the other shit — it’ll fall into place eventually. What’s most important is you and me. I want this. I wanna be all in.”

And his heart. Oh, his heart. Broken and bruised and scarred, but being pieced back together bit by bit. He loves her. He wants to tell her this (for real this time) but mumbles instead, “I don’t have much I can offer you, Kie.” Because it’s the truth, and she has to know it, if she hadn’t known already.

Something flashes in her eyes, then. Similar to the flames that were there before, when she started talking, but different somehow. A fire not made of anger, but desire. She looks right at him, at his eyes, then his lips, then his eyes again. He can’t look anywhere but at her beautiful face.  _ She’s here. She came back.  _ He doesn’t think he could love her more even if he tried.

Then she is whispering, “I don’t care.” And her hands are coming to his face. And her pretty eyes are fluttering closed. And her mouth is on his, finally,  _ finally. _

Kissing Kie feels like a homecoming.

(Only ten days, but it felt like forever.)

His whole body hums with energy, fueled by the little sigh Kie makes as she falls against him, bringing her hands to rest on his shoulders. JJ wraps his arms around her middle, pulling her as close as he can without making her belly uncomfortable. He feels that all-too-familiar warmth pool in his gut, rush to his head, leading his hands to clutch tighter to her hips and his tongue to lightly touch her lower lip. He grins as she opens her mouth to him, sighing once again, and soon she has him backed against the wall, her fingers tangling themselves in the unruly hair at the nape of his neck. 

And he kisses her, and kisses her, and kisses her, even though he probably stinks of beer, because he can and because he’s wanted to for what feels like a  _ much _ longer time than what it really was and she’s here, she came back for him, which might mean she loves him,  _ actually _ loves him, and if that’s true, it’s the best thing he’s ever known. 

She pulls away eventually, breathing heavily, hair mussed and smiling. “Can we do that later, please?”

JJ doesn’t have to ask her to clarify what she meant by  _ that _ . The way she lazily runs her palms down the front of his chest to rest at his waistband is all the explanation he needs. “Yes,” he says, breathless too. “I missed you.” Kie smiles again and he thinks he might collapse. “Fuck, you’re so beautiful,” he whispers, running a thumb along the line of her cheekbone, the curve of her lips.

She reaches up to kiss him again, then playfully hooks a finger under the cord of his shark-tooth necklace to pull him forward off the wall. “So…” she says, stepping back from him. “Turkey?”

JJ doesn’t think he’s ever been more excited to go to a stupid Thanksgiving dinner in his life. He grins. “Turkey.”

* * *

Kiara is surprised at just how well her Thanksgiving is going so far.

She figures she probably shouldn’t have been too worried, seeing as it was her parents who had invited JJ in the first place, and also knowing that JJ was the world’s best schmoozer, having honed his small-talking-with-old-people skills while working at the Country Club years ago. But, still. It’s the first time JJ has met her parents — or at least in the ‘I’m sleeping with your daughter’ sense — and, as JJ tells her while she’s taking him for a house tour a few minutes after they arrive, the first time he’s ever been to her house.

“You’ve been here before, JJ, _ ” _ Kie scoffs as she opens the door to her bedroom (messy, because JJ’s seen the worst of her already, so why would he care if her bed wasn’t made?).

JJ shakes his head as he steps inside the room. “Nope. Only John B and Sarah have,” he clarifies, and Kie nods in affirmation, remembering back to last year around this same time when the two of them had visited from Charleston. “Your dad likes John B, remember? Not me.” 

Even though she knows he’s just joking, Kie rolls her eyes as she shuts the door behind her. “My dad likes you just fine,” she says. “Especially since you brought him his favourite whiskey as a thank you gift.” Her dad had brightened up considerably when JJ had handed him the bottle they’d bought at the liquor store only ten minutes before JJ and Kie had shown up at her parents’ place.

“What can I say?” JJ says, stepping towards her and pressing her gently against the door. “I’m great at charming the oldies.” She chuckles as he plants a kiss on the hollow part of her collarbone.

“You’re an idiot,” she grins, reaching up to run her fingers through his hair as his hands come to loop around her waist. She’d so missed touching him, feeling the warmth of his body against hers — even if it’s slightly awkward with her bump in the way — and how the calluses on his fingers lightly graze over her skin while he holds her. Now that she’s got him back, she’s never letting him go.

Kie’s still kind of in shock, really, that she had the balls to just show up at his house unannounced and invite him to dinner. It had been a wild idea from her mom, but one that had thankfully worked. 

“You love it,” he teases, pressing another kiss to her neck. And then to the bridge of her nose, the corner of her lips, square on her mouth. 

They’ve only been reunited for an hour or so, but the two of them have already slipped back into that comfortable, easy way of being together that has been the hallmark of their relationship since the very beginning. Kie’s so grateful for the kisses and the banter and the silly grins, even if she knows they’ve still got a lot to talk about, because it means that this is going to  _ work. _ That whatever happens — with the baby or their families or the world — they’ll be okay from now on.

“We’re  _ not _ doing this here,” Kie murmurs in between kisses. “My parents are right next door.”

“Mmm,” JJ mumbles as he kisses a line down her neck, one hand trailing down to lift up the edge of her dress (much to her chagrin, skirts and dresses are all she can fit nowadays) and come to rest on the curve of her ass. “Wish we could, though. I think I’ve just discovered I kind of have this fantasy of fucking you in your childhood bedroom,” he admits with the boldest, cheekiest grin she’s ever seen.

Kie blushes bright pink but laughs it off, craning her neck away from him and pushing herself up and away off the wall. “Another time, maybe,” she tells him, even though the mental image of them doing  _ that _ is clear in her mind. “I still have to show you the bathroom.”

“Can’t the bathroom wait?” JJ groans, but lets himself be dragged off down the hall by Kie all the same.

The dinner itself goes swimmingly.

It’s obvious that Kie’s mom and dad are trying hard to make JJ feel comfortable by asking him lots of questions about himself. Whether he hopes the baby is a boy or girl (he doesn’t mind, but secretly...girl), how he likes working at Joe’s Auto Shop (quite a lot, actually), what his plans are for the future (nothing is set in stone apart from taking care of Kie and the baby in whatever ways he can). JJ’s great at answering all of them — those country-club-schmoozer-skills are in full effect — but the conversation is still a little awkward. Especially when Kie’s mom accidentally mentions Luke Maybank, and Kie watches JJ’s jaw clench shut as he says through gritted teeth,  _ “I don’t really have any contact with him anymore.” _ (That’s when Kie’d reached for his hand under the table and clutched it tight until the conversation moved onto easier topics.)

But then the whiskey and the mulled wine start to flow, and the conversation between the four of them relaxes considerably, punctuated by plenty of laughs. Kie watches with delight as JJ entertains her parents, his blue eyes bright with mischief as he teases her mom for not liking cranberry sauce and gets into a playful argument with her dad over whether or not the Carolina Panthers will win their next game against the Miami Dolphins. 

Kie is well aware that there is a lot of serious shit that she and JJ need to talk about. There have been some apologies, yes, but just saying  _ sorry _ to each other after the biggest fight they’ve ever had and expecting things to go on like normal is unrealistic. They need to discuss what happened, how they’re going to fix those issues that came up (JJ feeling unworthy, Kie feeling trapped, fears as parents, et-fucking-cetera), and figure out how the two of them are going to work in the future. Everyone is always saying that  _ communication is key _ , right? They should  _ probably _ follow that advice, for once in their lives.

And there’s that all-important thing: that JJ told Kie he loved her, and that Kie wants to say it back.

These are all things they’ll need to talk about before they can really move on from the past two weeks, but even with that serious conversation outstanding, Kie feels all warm inside when she looks across the table at her parents and finds them smiling and laughing at JJ while he regales them with a tale about the first time he met John B.

They feel like a real family: Kie, her mom and dad, JJ...and one day soon, the baby. Kie can almost picture the dining table with one extra setting. A highchair with a little plate of mashed up sweet potatoes and turkey stuffing, seating a tiny, chubby baby boy or girl with JJ’s eyes and Kie’s curls who cooes and giggles as their grandparents fuss over them. 

It’s an image that seems almost too good to be true. And just a few days — hell, even  _ hours _ ago — Kie might have agreed. 

But today, it feels like that’s going to be a reality.

Kie helps her dad with the dishes after dinner is finished, drying plates clean while her dad washes. JJ and Kie's mom are happily chatting together on the couches in the living room. JJ had asked to help with the clean-up, but Kie had insisted on the opposite. Selfishly, she wanted some quiet time with her dad to talk.

They're just over halfway through the dishes when Kie, heartbeat hammering in her throat because she's still nervous even after the success of the day to ask, “So, what do you think?”

Kie watches as her father’s hands still in the soapy water, just for a millisecond before he starts washing again, but enough for her to notice the hesitation. He looks over at her and grins. “Your dish-drying skills? They're okay, I guess.”

She rolls her eyes and playfully elbows her dad in the side. “You know what I’m talking about.”

He nods and clears his throat, the silly grin slipping ever so slightly as he becomes more serious. After a long pause, during which Kie keeps her fidgety hands occupied by aggressively drying a roasting dish, her dad says, “I like him more than I thought I would. He kind of grows on you.”

Kie’s chest fills with sudden warmth at the statement. It was true: JJ did grow on people. He was loud and crude and a troublemaker, but he was also unfailingly loyal and fun and kind, with a lovable spirit that endeared you to him over time, until there was a space in the chambers of your heart dedicated just to JJ, his laugh making its home in there before you knew it. She releases a breath she hadn’t known she was holding, and smiles. “He does,” she says, then nudges her dad’s shoulder with her own. “Thanks, Dad. For having him here. For having us. It means a lot.”

Her dad pauses his dishwashing to swing an arm around Kie’s shoulders, pressing a quick kiss to her temple. His beard scratches her skin, and he smells faintly of soap mixed with the cologne he always wears (from Gap, because he always says that he doesn’t believe in spending money on stupid shit like perfume). The hug is so familiar, so warm. Kie wraps her arm around her father’s waist and pulls him closer, because she hasn’t hugged him properly in so long, and it feels right.

“Your mom and I just want to see you happy, sweetheart,” her dad mumbles against her hair, soap suds dripping from his wet hand onto her shoulder. “We’re —  _ I’m _ — sorry for trying to push my way into your life. You’re an adult now, and you’re completely capable of making your own decisions.” One more kiss to her forehead and he pulls away again, tugging the plug out of the drain and letting the sink empty out. “I’m glad you came home for a while, but I’m happy that you’re back with him, too,” he says with a smile and a sigh, looking at Kie with eyes that seem to sparkle with emotion. “It seems to be where you belong.”

A loud whoop of laughter resounds from the living room, followed by JJ’s voice saying  _ “I swear that’s how it happened, Mrs. C!” _ Kie can’t help but smile. “I think so, too,” she replies, drying her hands on the slightly damp dish towel. Then, even though the words taste strange on her tongue after months of disuse, Kie says, “Love you, Dad.”

“Love you too, sweet pea,” he says, grinning again. Then he grabs one of the mugs they’d just cleaned and asks, “You want me to make some hot cocoa for you and JJ?” Kie enthusiastically accepts, knowing that her dad’s cinnamon hot chocolates are the best in the Banks. 

Soon, Kie and JJ are drinking their warm mugs of cocoa out on those two beloved deckchairs on the back part of the porch, swaddled up in blankets while they watch the sky grow pink as the sun begins to set.

Kie’s favourite person in her favourite place. It feels fitting. She tells JJ as much.

“I love sitting out here. Even when it’s cold, or snowing, or thunderstorming.”

JJ’s hand is wrapped in hers, her head on his shoulder. He sips his hot cocoa and asks, “Why is that?”

Kie shrugs and pulls the blanket higher around her neck. It sure is pretty fucking cold out. “I don’t know. I like watching the birds and the trees. It’s kind of calming. I sometimes bring my notepad and my ukulele out here to write songs.”

JJ chuckles and presses a kiss to her temple. “Of course you come out here to write songs,” he says, looking out over the garden. A little blue and black swallow bounces across the grass, stopping every so often to dig for worms. In just a couple months, that grass might be covered in the light, slushy snow that falls sometimes in the Banks. “You ever gonna write a song about me?” JJ asks, a cheeky grin on his face.

She looks up at him and crooks an eyebrow. “I only write songs about things I actually  _ like _ ,” she teases. JJ rolls his eyes but pulls her tighter to him. It’s an awkward kind of hug, seeing as there’s two wooden armrests in the way, but it feels good just the same.

They sit in silence for a while, watching the swallow and sipping their hot drinks. When it starts to get uncomfortable — when Kie’s mug is empty and she’s got nothing to occupy her hands or her mouth with — Kie decides that they need to begin that all-important serious conversation she had promised herself she’d initiate. “So…” she starts, trailing off and peering up at JJ. 

He looks down at her through his shaggy hair that falls over his eyes. Those beautiful blue eyes she’d thought about every night they were apart, so blue she sometimes thinks they might not be real. “So…” he echoes.

They both speak at the same time. “I think we should—”

“How have you—”

Kie laughs and says, “Oh, sorry. You go first.”

JJ shakes his head. “No, no, you can talk.”

And now they’re both just being stupid. Sarah’s voice is in the back of Kie’s head:  _ You need to learn how to communicate with him. _ (And also, a little quieter,  _ he loves you. _ ) “JJ, don’t make it weird,” Kie jokes, gently pushing against his shoulder. “Go on.”

JJ clears his throat and, with a voice that shakes a little with nerves, asks, “How have you been the past couple weeks? Like, you know...after the fight, when you said you needed space to figure things out. Did you?” Kie pulls back from his embrace and furrows her eyebrows at him, ready to open her mouth and reply, but JJ cuts her off by chuckling and saying, “And I know you kinda already answered that when you showed up on my doorstep or whatever, but I feel like we should properly talk about it. I’m trying to be better at communication. Pope’s forcing me to be.” His pretty lips turn up into a smile as he speaks his friend’s name, no doubt thinking back to some conversation the two of them had had. 

“Yeah, Sarah’s doing the same to me,” Kie sniggers. “Nosy assholes.” 

She looks over at JJ, watches him watching her, a thoughtful kind of smile still lingering on his lips. She takes in his scruffy hair, almost long enough to be tucked behind his ears; the thin scar on his jaw, turned slightly pink in the cold; those blue, blue eyes, searching her face just as she is searching his. He’s wearing a button-up flannel and jeans, probably the nicest outfit he owns. Kie had helped him iron the shirt before they left for her parents’ house this afternoon, and she remembers the gratitude she had felt as she’d watched him pull on the shirt, look in the mirror and ask her  _ do you think I look okay? _ JJ had been so worried about making the right impression on her parents. It had been equal parts cute and reassuring, because it showed — if she hadn’t already got it before — that he was serious about her and her family.

And then she remembers how her heart had jumped in her chest when he’d opened the door to her this afternoon, the relief she’d felt coursing through her veins as they’d kissed. She thinks about how much she’s missed him, how wrong it felt to lie awake at night and feel Gremlin move and not have him next to her, ready to put his palm on her belly and say, with that wonderfully child-like surprise filling his voice,  _ holy shit, did you feel that?! _

Kie thinks again of Sarah saying  _ he loves you so much _ , and of JJ sad eyes when he’d said  _ I don’t know how else I’m supposed to say it _ . And it feels very real, and very final, and very good when she thinks  _ I love him, and I’m gonna tell him. _

She shifts in the deckchair so she’s turned towards JJ, not caring that her belly is pressing uncomfortably against the armrest or that the edge of the chair is digging into her thighs, because when she says all this, she wants to be able to look him in the eye.

“I thought that being away from you and being back home,” she starts, “would help me figure out what I wanted to do with my life and what I wanted from you and me and the baby. And it— well, I guess it helped in some sense,” she shrugs, “purely because I was so fucking miserable the whole time that I realised that— that the only thing I figured out is that I want to be with you. No matter what. It’s like...nothing else matters but that.” Kie watches as JJ’s face softens, his jaw unclenches. As if he was preparing for a letdown that didn’t come. “When I think of the future, I don’t just think of me anymore,” she continues softly. “I think of me, and you, and the baby.” Kie pauses, swallows, sits there as JJ doesn’t say anything for one beat, two. Then, in a rush, she follows on with, “I don’t know if that’s too much, but—”

“It’s not too much,” JJ interrupts, shaking his head, eyes wet. “It’s— you’re—” he cocks his head and sighs. “You know how I feel about you, Kie,” he says, and Kie sucks in a short breath on reflex, her heartbeat stuck in her throat.

_ Are you in love with him? _

_ Yes. _

But the words she really wants to say —  _ do you know how I feel about  _ you _?  _ — don’t come, buried by fear that rushes unbidden into her chest that weighs her down. She says instead, “I was afraid.”

JJ’s eyebrows knit themselves together, his forehead creasing with worry, but he doesn’t say anything, just reaches out his hand to hold hers in silent understanding. His palms are calloused but warm, pale skin perfectly contrasting hers. She looks down at their joined hands and continues. “I  _ am _ afraid,” she breathes. “Like, what if this doesn’t work out? We didn’t  _ plan _ to get together. We definitely didn’t plan on having a baby. I guess I thought — think — that one day we’ll decide it’s not working, and the baby will be stuck with two parents who don’t love—” She pauses, red flushing her cheeks. “Who aren’t together,” she corrects. “I don’t want that for our kid.”

Kie lifts her gaze to meet his again, finding him grinning at her with that familiar cheekiness and warmth she’d grown so used to and had missed so much over the past couple weeks. “Look,” he says, “I’m not about to start making marriage proposals again, because you’ve already said no twice and I don’t think I can handle more rejection.” She rolls her eyes at that, kicking her slippered foot out to playfully nudge his shin. He just keeps grinning. “But you know you don’t have to worry about that, right? Neither of us know what will happen in the future, but I can promise you that I’m sticking around for the long run. Ain’t no way you’re gettin’ rid of me that easily, Carrera,” he teases.

More than satisfied with his answer, she turns her body again to snuggle back into his side, resting her head on his shoulder. He presses another kiss to her hair and rubs his thumb along the back of her hand. Together, they look back out over the garden. The swallow has flown away, but it’s been replaced by a small band of brown sparrows.

“What about you, then?” Kie asks him after a long pause in conversation. “How have you been?”

He sighs. “Pretty fucking miserable too. I think John B saw me cry for the first time over FaceTime—”

“JJ—“

“I’m kidding, I’m kidding,” he chuckles. “Well, technically I’m not, but I am. Anyway, yeah, it sucked. Just missed you a lot. Worried about you and Gremlin.” JJ’s hand moves up to rest against her belly. “If you were taking your vitamins and getting enough sleep and all that.”

“I was,” she smiles.” Mom and Dad took good care of me.”

“I knew they would. Still worried. Still missed you.” Then, after clearing his throat, “I saw my dad.”

Kie cranes her neck to look up at him, frowning in surprise. “What? Where?”

JJ keeps watching the sparrows, but from what Kie can see from her odd angle on his face, his eyes don’t really seem to be  _ seeing _ the sparrows. They look out of focus, like he’s really looking at something very far away. “He came into the shop again. We talked. He asked me about whether you were pregnant or not, and if it was mine. I told him yes. He asked if I was  _ doing the right thing _ , whatever the fuck that means. It was so weird. Only lasted like, a minute or two. I kept thinking he’d get angry, swing out to hit me or something. But he didn’t. He just looked kind of...pathetic. I don’t know.” He shakes his head. When he speaks again, his voice cracks a little with emotion, and Kie is overwhelmed with fury at Luke Maybank for treating his son so badly that even just  _ seeing _ his father affects him deeply. “I don’t get why he would just...show up there like that. There’s plenty of other places he could have gone. He didn’t even-- I don’t even know if he was there to pick up something, or—”

He sounds so much like a confused child that Kie’s heart squeezes painfully. “Maybe he misses you,” she whispers, only half-believing the words herself.

“He doesn’t fucking  _ miss _ me, Kiara,” JJ drawls, voice dripping with sarcasm. “I’m sorry, but it’s true.”

“He asked about me, though, right?” Kie presses. “And the baby? And he asked what you were doing about it?”

“I mean, yeah…”

“Did he seem angry to you?”

“No. He seemed...sad. Or...guilty.”

“I think that maybe...maybe he’s realising that every shitty thing he’s ever done is catching up to him now. That he’s never going to be a grandfather to this kid. And that it’s  _ his _ fault. Maybe he feels guilty about that. Like he regrets it, or something.” As Kie talks, she realises that it might actually be true. She’d originally presented the idea because she couldn’t handle JJ feeling shit about himself for another second, but now that she thinks about, it makes a lot of sense. 

Luke Maybank is an awful human being, but he’s still human. And even someone like Luke is capable of emotion. Anger. Regret. Pity. Sorrow. Perhaps Luke really  _ did _ show up at Joe’s because he wanted to see his son. Maybe he thought he could fix things. Maybe he just wanted to see him in person, see that he was doing okay, before disappearing from JJ’s life again. Maybe they’ll never really know.

“Or something,” JJ continues. “I don’t know, Kie, it was— it was just so weird. It made me feel so confused.” He shakes his head again, forcefully this time, like he’s trying to physically shake off any of his bad feelings. “Fuck,” he sighs, exasperated. “I don’t want our kid to ever have any issues with me, you know?” 

“They won’t,” Kie insists fiercely. “And you know why they won’t? Because you’re gonna be a great fucking father. And I know this because I— because I—”

And he looks down at her then, eyes wet again with unshed, frustrated tears, worrying his bottom lip with his teeth. And Kie decides that this is the moment. This is the right time to say it. This is where it’s all gonna change, for better or for worse.

She sucks in a deep breath and turns to look at him face on again. Gremlin, active as ever these days as she inches closer to the end of her pregnancy and the day the little one will come earthside, kicks against her and JJ’s joined hands, and the reminder of the life they have created together stirs Kie on to say what she’s wanted to say for a long time. “I know how you feel about me, but do you know how I feel about you?” JJ’s gaze is so warm, so full of hope. Her heart hammers loudly in her chest. “Remember when you said that you— you loved me?”

“Yeah,” he whispers, barely more than a breath.

All at once, memories from the past few years fill Kie’s mind, like she’s flicking through a stack of sun-drenched Polaroids. 

The summer they found the gold. Running from the cops with him; going to his dad’s house with him; holding him in the hot tub as he cried.

The card game they’d played on the couch while drunk this time last year; JJ pulling off his shirt after he lost a round; Kie climbing into his lap to kiss him. 

Surfing together, cooking dinner together, watching Netflix together. 

Every time they’d stood at the end of the Chateau’s driveway and waved goodbye to their friends. 

The first time they’d slept together; then the second, the third, the ninth. 

Finding out she was pregnant in that stinking Walmart bathroom. 

The look on his face when she’d told him. How she thought he wouldn’t want it, but had proved her so very wrong. 

Sitting on the phone with him while she was at that family reunion, listening to him process his thoughts about his father. 

The first sonogram, when she’d kissed him spontaneously in the parking lot. 

All the little things he did for her to show her that he cared while they lived together, before her dad had arrived at the Chateau that one morning and everything got fucked up for a while. 

Showing up on his doorstep in the rain this afternoon. Apologising. Kissing him. Trying to show him just how much she loved him with actions rather than words.

_ I don’t have much I can offer you, Kie. _

_ I don’t care. _

It’s a highlight reel of important moments, stretching all the way back to the first time he kissed her at that goddamn birthday party, where she’d realised that maybe boys weren’t all that gross, and that maybe JJ Maybank in particular was kind of okay.

It’s all these moments pieced together that gives Kie the courage to finally say, “I love you too. I love you, JJ."

He’s silent for one long second. He gulps, his Adam’s apple bobbing. His lips part in surprise. “Oh,” he breathes. “Okay. Okay, that’s fine, that’s cool. I love you too, by the way,” he adds, like it’s an afterthought, like he really wants to make sure she knows it.

And the moment is all so overwhelmingly perfect and stupid and just so  _ them _ that Kie laughs and says, “I know,” then continues, all in a self-conscious rush, “look, I love you, and I know that you’re going to be a great dad, and I’m so happy I’m with you, and I just—  _ fuck,  _ can you come here for a second?”

JJ seems to know exactly what Kie was trying to get at, untangling his hand from hers then surging forward to cup her cheeks in his palms and, with a short inhale of breath, to press his lips to hers.

Kissing JJ never gets old. His hands on the sides of her face feel strong and safe, his tongue warm in her mouth, her heartbeat loud in her ears. He tastes of cinnamon and chocolate and something distinctly  _ JJ _ that she’ll never grow tired of —  _ never. _

It’s a good few minutes before the two of them break away from one another, both breathing heavily with cheeks flushed.

JJ settles back into his chair and smiles at her with a grin so wide, so cheeky, she can’t help but mirror it. “So, you love me, huh?” he asks, all fake-bravado, because of course he’d find a way to make a joke out of all this. She kind of (actually really) loves him for it.

“Don’t get all big headed about it,” she teases back, rolling her eyes.

“I’m not,” he says, a little more serious now, that silly grin dialing down a few notches in it’s brightness. “It’s just...it’s nice. I’ve never been loved before.”

And oh, how her heart breaks so easily for him all the time. She reaches out to touch his shoulder, rubbing her thumb against the fabric of his shirt. “Don’t say that, JJ, it’s not true.”

“No, you know what I mean,” he says, resting his own hand over Kie’s, then bringing them down to join together in his lap. “I know John B and Pope and Sarah, and probably even my mom and dad at some point in my life, have loved me but...it’s not the same. It’s not the same feeling as this.” And the smile is back, lighting up his handsome face so bright. “It’s like you love me...I don’t know...differently. It’s nice.”

Kie leans forward to kiss him again, smiling into his mouth, something that feels like liquid gold running through her bloodstream.

“Are we gonna be as soppy as John B and Sarah now that we’ve said the L word?” Kie jokes when she pulls away a second time.

“Fuck, no,” JJ laughs. “If we ever get to be as gross as them, you have permission to break up with me on the spot.”

Kie raises an eyebrow at him. “We kind of need to be in a relationship to break up with each other. I think we’ve already established that.”

“Okay, well, does that mean I can call you my girlfriend now?”

She supposes she should have expected this, based on their conversation, but it’s still a welcome surprise. Kie swallows down the massive grin that tries to stretch across her face and keeps her composure. “If you ask me,” she says airily.

He smiles at her. “Will you be my girlfriend?” 

“No. Kidding! Yes.”

He rolls his eyes but kisses her anyway. “Hilarious, Kiara. You’re a real comedian. I guess now we can stop all that  _ we’re not really together _ shit, right?”

“Right,” she grins. “Boyfriend. Hmm. I still like ‘Baby Daddy’ better.”

“You would,” JJ scoffs. “C’mere and give Daddy a kiss,” he jokes in a terrible baby voice.

Kie makes a face like she’s going to vomit. “Please never say that again.” They both laugh, then settle back into each other’s arms. “Anyway, in all seriousness...I love you not just because you’re my  _ baby daddy, _ okay?” Kie says sincerely. “I love you because...because I do. I don’t know. I just do.” She peers up at him. “Is that enough?”

She watches as his face changes yet again, his smile softening, his eyes crinkling at the edges. “That’s enough.”

The sun is setting now, pastel blues and pinks and oranges filling the sky above them. A beautiful end to a beautiful day. There’s a chill in the air, though, and Kie can hear her parents’ voices from inside the house. They should probably be getting back soon, but Kie wants to stay out here just a little longer. It’s too perfect of a moment.

After a while, JJ says something that takes her by surprise. And it’s not a declaration of love again or anything like that, but something that still helps reinforce Kie’s knowledge that he loves her completely. “You know, I’ve always imagined you opening up your own turtle sanctuary or something here. Like being a scientist or a conservationist or whatever. The girl version of Steve Irwin or some shit.”

If Kie’s heart swelled any more, her ribs would break. Sarah and Kiara had dreamed long ago, when they were busy saving baby turtles on the beach, of opening up their own sanctuary. Kie had thought about that old dream for the first time in years while she’d spent some time alone over the past few weeks, but she’d never shared her ideas with anyone.

How does JJ know her so well?

Sarah would probably tell Kie that it’s because he takes notice of her, and cares about her life, and loves her. She wouldn’t be wrong.

“Really? You think I could actually do that?”

“I think you could do anything, Kiara.”

Kie doesn’t know if she’s ever felt this happy in her life. “Hmm. Maybe I will one day. And just for the record, I always thought you’d open up your own shop some day.” She’s not saying that just to be nice, either. JJ has always had a head for business -- whether legal or illegal -- and she knows he’s always wanted to be his own boss.

JJ pulls her closer with an arm around her shoulders. “Old Joe  _ was  _ talking about retirement the other day. Maybe I can convince him to sell the shop to me when he’s done.”

“Maybe you could.” It’s a lovely picture, a wonderful dream, and one Kie hopes becomes a reality one day. JJ with his own shop. Kie working as a conservationist. Their little girl or boy, running happily around town, getting to grow up in the best place on earth. Perhaps Pope and John B and Sarah will all move back to the Banks at some point, too, and the old gang can all get back together and grow old on the Banks like they always wanted. 

But Kie supposes that might not happen, and might not even be as important to her as it once was. Because JJ and their unborn child are the most significant people in her life now, so as long as she has them, she’ll be okay.

“I love you,” she says, firm and final. Because she does. He’s her best friend and she  _ loves _ him. And now that she’s said it once, she won’t ever stop. “I like saying that.”

He kisses her head and she listens to him whisper into her curls, “I like you saying it too.”

The twilight dims to black. They go back inside, say goodbye and thank you, then head to the Chateau. Kie leaves her things at her parents, planning to pick them up at a later date. Now that things are fixed between both her parents and JJ she can come and go from each house as she pleases. 

When they get back to JJ’s place (their  _ home _ , now; always), the two of them waste no time picking up where they’d left off earlier that day. His hands in her hair, on her cheeks, on her waist. Her mouth on his own, her hands tugging his shirt over his head, the press of his warm body against hers as they fall onto their bed.

He touches her carefully, reverently, pausing so many times to ask if she’s comfortable that Kie just starts kissing him to shut him up until he gets the message and focuses on the movements of his hands, his hips. 

This isn’t just fucking, now. Probably hasn’t been for a long time, whether they’d known it or not. This is making love, however cringey or sickly sweet that sounds to Kie’s own ears, because they  _ love  _ each other. They’ve said it, they do, maybe always have. And it makes this — and everything else — different in all the very best of ways.

Afterwards, Kie lies wrapped up in JJ’s arms, his chest pressed against her back, his warm breath softly tickling her ear, listening as it slows and deepens as he falls asleep. She feels Gremlin stir in her belly and JJ’s hand flexes instinctively at its resting point on her hip, as if he can feel the baby moving in his sleep. 

Kie smiles to herself, and falls into a deep sleep of her own, thinking,  _ Yes, this is home. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> how are we feeling????????????? let me know in the comments my friends!! love u all sm
> 
> (thank you once again to shannon for being a fab beta reader and to the bitches in the jiara gc for hyping me up always)


	17. december nights

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is the longest i’ve ever waited between posting chapters — SORRY!!! life is crazy and i’m terrible at keeping promises when it comes to writing. thank you to all you beautiful readers for sticking with this story and regularly messaging me on tumblr telling me to get my A into G hehe 🥰 
> 
> here’s a great big helping of Pure Fluff for our favourite outer banks couple. i’m not a huge fluff fan, so writing this kinda feels out of character for me (y’all know how much i love my angst), but i decided it was time we got some absolute pure fluff for these two after all they’ve been through 
> 
> this chapter was meant to be two seperate ones, but i decided to stick it all into one, which means i have LOADS of songs for this chapter: 
> 
> ‘trace’ - skullcrusher  
> ‘seven’ - taylor swift  
> ‘clean slate’ - donovan woods  
> ‘heavy head (keep it near)’ - brooke bentham  
> ‘willow’ - taylor swift  
> ‘she waits for me to come back down’ - donovan woods & katie pruitt  
> ‘anything’ - adrianne lecker  
> ‘healthy baby boy’ - john-robert  
> ‘river’ - joni mitchell
> 
> you can find allll of those and more in my spotify playlist (link in summary of the previous chapter!!) 
> 
> enjoy my dear friends xoxo

November ends. The days get colder and wetter and windier. All the leaves fall from the trees. Birdsong dies as the sparrows and thrushes migrate south for the winter. The roads get icy and there’s frost on the ground almost every morning.

Winter in the Outer Banks is not nearly as harsh as other parts of the country, or even the state, but it’s still cold enough for Kie to hate it. And now that she’s so pregnant it feels like she’s carrying a ten-ton balloon strapped to the front of her body, the cold makes her joints ache, too.

Her due date is fast approaching, and as each day passes Kie feels more and more uncomfortable. A full nights’ sleep usually evades her now — a peek at what will come when the baby is born. JJ tries his best to help her as much as he can, as do her parents, but there’s only so much good massages and hot compresses can do. Kie’s going stir-crazy being stuck inside due to the cold weather, with not even Fisher’s cuddles or Netflix being enough to distract her from her uncomfy-ness.

And so, with three weeks to go until Christmas, and with permission via one excited FaceTime call with John B, JJ and Kie start a project to transform the spare bedroom — JJ’s old room — into a sanctuary for the baby.

It’s meant to be a distraction-project for Kie — something to keep her mind and hands busy while she waits out the last month of her pregnancy — but it turns into an activity that is a whole lot more fun than either of them had planned.

Cleaning out the spare room is a bit of a mission. It’s barely been touched since Kie semi-officially moved into the house in September and the two of them had claimed John B’s old room as their own. It’s been their “junk room” since then — filled with broken furniture they’d been meaning to get rid of and boxes crammed with John B and Sarah’s stuff that they’d taken out of the drawers and off the walls in the other room — so it takes a while for the two of them to throw away all the unwanted shit and repackage the stuff they want to save. 

But soon enough, the room is devoid of all clutter and dust and is a blank canvas once again, ready to be decorated with fresh paint and gender-neutral baby things and a crib from IKEA they bought secondhand off of Craigslist.

There’s more than one trip to the local hardware store to pick out the paint, because the first time JJ picked up the wrong kind of brush, and the second time Kie decided she didn’t like the shade of blue they had originally chosen for the room, even after JJ had already painted a section of the wall.

They end up choosing a soft yellow, because Kie says it reminds her of sand and sunshine, which JJ agrees with, even though he teases her for being sappy. They decide it’s not too safe for Kie to climb up on the ladder to reach the higher parts of the walls, and her feet hurt if she stays standing for too long, so she sits on the floor and paints the bottom half while JJ deals with the rest. Fisher tries to help paint by sticking his paws in the paint bucket and spreading it all over the walls, which — of course — creates a huge mess. JJ and Kie try to keep him out of the room while they paint, but his whines from outside the house are too pitying to ignore, so the two of them allow him to sit inside with them as long as he stays in the middle of the bedroom and doesn’t touch the painting stuff.

(That lasts for about three minutes until his nose is covered in yellow from sniffing the walls again.)

It takes them two days to paint the room and two days to air it out before they start (attempting) to furnish it. 

A small dresser for all the baby clothes Sarah’s been sending over; a lamp with star cut-outs on the lampshade that projects a constellation onto the ceiling when turned on; a box filled with toys Kie got secondhand at the charity shop; a few framed photographs of the Pogues, Kie’s parents, JJ and Kie and her bump. All of these items are easy to set up. All except the crib from Craigslist.

Kie finds JJ mumbling to himself in the middle of Gremlin’s bedroom, sitting in the same spot she left him in two hours ago to go have lunch with her mom. He looks like a crazy person: hair all standing up on its ends, like he’s run his sweaty hands through it one too many times; flecks of paint still on his face; teeth worrying his lower lip so much it looks like he may be starting to draw blood. 

“Fuckin’ IKEA,” she hears him mutter as she comes to stand in the doorway, hip resting against the doorframe. Kie bites back a laugh as she watches him fumble with the IKEA-provided wrench (which, to be fair to JJ, is  _ way _ too fucking small for adult fingers). “Why are there no instructions with this?” he grumbles through his teeth as he tries and fails to screw on one of the crib legs. “Those fuckin’ Swedes. Pretending like they’re smarter than me. I knew I shouldn’t have bought off of Craigslist. Fuckin’ scammers…”

And now Kie  _ does _ laugh at that. JJ’s head whips up, his eyes softening when he sees her. “You alright?” she asks, still giggling. “D’you need to roll one?”

His nose crinkles and he tilts his head to the side, just like Fisher does when he doesn’t understand a command. “What?”

Kie rolls her eyes goodnaturedly and crosses her arms over her chest. “I meant: do you need a smoke?”

Recognition flutters across his face. He blinks. “Oh. No. I stopped.” JJ stands up, dusting his hands off on his cargo shorts. He flashes her a shy grin. “Figured I’d kick the habit before the baby comes,” he says quietly.

Kie’s heart swells, as it does so often these days. “Oh,” she whispers as she exhales.

He walks towards her and reaches out to pull her close to him, her belly pressed against his stomach. “Well, to be honest, I started again after you left, but…” JJ brushes a tumble of curls over her shoulder and plants a quick kiss on her forehead. “I’m good now. I wanna be good for the baby.”

“J…” Kie reaches up to cup his cheek, rubbing her thumb along his jawline. “That’s very sweet of you.”

He grins. “I know. I’m a sweet dude. Just so sweet…” He leans forward as if to kiss her—

But a paint-covered hand smooshes itself onto her head instead. “Hey!” she squeals, jumping away from JJ and immediately trying to wipe the paint out of her hair. “How did you—” She turns and the answer lies right there next to her: an open can of paint on a stool next to the door. “I fucking  _ hate  _ you,” Kie grumbles, but JJ just grins. The words must lack a bit of bite when she’s got yellow paint dripping down the side of her face. 

Well, she’ll have to  _ give _ them bite.

Quick as a heavily pregnant young woman could be, Kie sticks her hand in the pot of paint and flings a glob of it onto JJ’s head, painting his hair the same colour as hers.

“Aw, come on!” he yelps, frantically wiping drips of paint away from his eyes. 

“What?” Kie laughs. “You think just because I’m pregnant I won’t retaliate?”

JJ glares at her through his mop of paint-stained hair. “I guess I  _ hoped! _ ” he groans. “You ruined my hair!”

She rolls her eyes and laughs again, because he looks ridiculous with his hair all sticking up with a paint slap on his cheek. “Oh, don’t get your panties in a twist. It’ll wash out— hey!” JJ’s arms are around her waist again, holding her tight but not forcefully, picking her up and spinning her around.

“Gotcha,” he chuckles into her hair as she beats his arms with a clenched fist.

“You can’t wrestle with a pregnant woman!” Kie complains, but JJ doesn’t let up except to let her touch the ground again, his fingers tickling her sides.

She tries and fails to wriggle away from him as he teases, “Oh, I thought I heard you say you wouldn’t hesitate to retaliate?”

“You’re so fucking—“ Kie’s insult is interrupted by a crash and a yelp that sounds like it came from a dog. They both whip around to find the stool and the paint can tipped over, most of the yellow liquid now dripping from Fisher’s fur. “Oh, Fisher, no!” Kie groans, starting towards the dog to clean him up before he makes even more of a mess.

But Fisher thinks she’s playing with him as she tries to wipe the paint off, shaking so the paint comes flying wildly off him and onto the walls, the floor, and Kie. The dog grins up at her with a wagging tail. 

It’s too stupid a situation to do anything but find it funny. JJ comes up behind her to hug her to him again, and they collapse onto the floor of Gremlin’s new room (one that will need yet  _ another _ paint job) in each other’s arms, laughing.

* * *

Sarah plans Kie a baby shower, even though Kie makes it very clear she’s not interested in having one.

“It’s just an excuse to get loads of shitty stuff that I don’t need,” Kie complains when Sarah suggests the idea over a phone call one afternoon two weeks before Christmas.

“That’s the whole point!” Sarah exclaims, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. Not for celebrating the upcoming birth of a new human,  _ no _ , but for receiving a shitton of plastic toys and cheap baby clothing the kid would grow out of in a month.

But Sarah’s enthusiasm is convincing enough, so Kie lets her send out Facebook invites to everyone they know inviting them to the event, Sarah promising Kie that it won’t be lame and that all presents would be  _ “completely and totally earth-friendly, because I know you appreciate that shit.” _

Kie’s mom volunteers to have the shower at their place, and gets right to work organising the decorations and food for the party, helped by Sarah through FaceTime. All offers of help from JJ and Kie are quickly shut down, which neither of them really mind because they’ve never been to a baby shower before and don’t know the first thing about organising one. 

The shower takes place less than a week before Christmas. Kie assumes that because of the late invitations and the timing of the party so close to a major holiday, the list of attendees will be lacking. Not so. Almost everyone Sarah had invited turns up, all armed with wrapped presents and smiles. Pope’s parents, Wheezie Cameron, a whole load of friends from school, her dad’s family from Wilmington and her mom’s family from further down south, Miss Lana — even Deputy Shoupe makes an appearance. And, of course, the Pogues.

She’d known they were all coming, but Kie’s heart still jumps excitedly in her chest when she spies Sarah and John B’s car pulling up in the driveway. 

“Sarah! Hi!” Kie exclaims, practically tackling her best friend the second she walks through the door. 

“Hey, babe!” Sarah giggles into her hair. She pulls back to hold Kie at arms length. “God, you’re so huge,” Sarah says, her wide-eyed gaze taking in the giant belly that protrudes from under Kie’s sweater.

“Gee, thanks,” Kie replies in monotone, raising a teasing eyebrow.

Sarah playfully rolls her eyes. “You know I mean it in the kindest way possible. You’ve got a whole ass baby in there.” She carefully rubs her palm over the swell of Kie’s belly, and something less joke-y descends over her face. “That’s insane,” she whispers, tears glistening at the corners of her eyes.

“Oh my God, don’t get all teary on me,” Kie chuckles, teasing again, although she does reach down to squeeze Sarah’s hand. 

“It’s just crazy, you know?” Sarah continues, voice wobbling a little, and Kie’s beginning to wonder who out of the two of them is the one who’s supposed to be crazy with the hormonal mood swings. “There’s this baby—“

John B clears his throat and steps over the threshold, a hand on his girlfriend’s back, gently pushing her inside so he can close the door to the cold. “Babe, you already cried about this in the car. We don’t need to go through this again,” he whispers soothingly, and Kie bites back a smile as she thinks of Sarah crying over Kie’s baby during the car ride over. Sarah nods and wipes her eyes. John B grins and tips his chin at Kie. “Hey, Kie, what’s up?”

“Hey, John B,” Kie replies, reaching around Sarah to give him a quick hug. “How are you?”

“Good, good. Stoked to be here. You look great.” Before Kie can say  _ thank you _ , John B’s attention turns elsewhere, his eyes searching over her shoulder for someone else. “Where’s— JJ!” John B presses a quick kiss to Kie’s hair, and then he’s off to greet his best friend, the sounds of hands slapping backs in what’s probably a tight man-hug echoing from down the hall.

“Boys, huh?” Kie says, rolling her eyes at Sarah.

“We’re stuck with ‘em unfortunately.” Sarah slips an arm around Kie’s waist and begins to walk them further inside to the living room, where the party is in full swing. “Is Pope here yet?”

“Yeah, he’s out back talking to my dad.” Pope had shown up with a huge box wrapped all fancy, promising her it wasn’t as expensive as it looked since he knew she hated people spending too much money on gifts, and had been stolen away from her all too quickly by her father. Pope, without argument the most responsible of all Kie’s friends, was her dad’s not-so-secret favourite.

“Is Sofie here too? I only met her that one time at the Halloween party.”

“No, she had an exam to study for, apparently. Pope said he’s bringing her down here for Christmas though.”

“Oh, cool. Shit, we’re really adults now, huh?” Sarah sighs, squeezing Kie’s side. “Making plans for Christmas and everything.”

“Speaking of plans…” Kie says as they stop by the snack table, which had been loaded with cliche pink and blue iced cookies. “My mom wanted you and John B to know that you’re invited to Christmas here this year. You don’t have to accept, because I don’t know if you’re doing something with Wheezie and Rose or whatever, but you—”

“No, no, we’d love to come,” Sarah replies with a bright smile. “That’s awesome. I love your mom so much.”

“She loves you too,” Kie says as she picks up a pink cookie and takes a bite. At Sarah’s bashful head shake, Kie insists, “No, really. I think she sometimes wishes you were her daughter instead of me. At least with you she can play dress up.”

Sarah laughs. “You suck.” Then: “Want me to get you some punch?”

At Kie’s  _ yes, please,  _ Sarah wanders off to get the drink, while Kie wanders off to find Pope, wanting to greet him properly as she only saw him at the door for a few seconds before her dad was stealing him away. 

She finds Pope over in the kitchen, chatting to Sarah as she pours Kie a drink, and the three of them are midway through a conversation about Christmas plans when they’re rudely interrupted by a shout from John B over in the living room.

“Hey! You guys wanna come play?” he asks, grinning with his hands on his hips as he stands in front of a table stacked with cups and bottles of beer. JJ’s at the other end of it, wearing a matching grin. 

“You set up a game of  _ beer pong? _ ” Kie asks incredulously. “At my  _ baby shower?” _

“Uh, yeah?” John B replies with a shrug, like it’s the most normal thing in the world.

Kie thinks back to her pre-pregnancy days and the shit they’d all get up to on a daily basis and figures: yeah, beer pong at her baby shower makes sense.

But, still. This is ridiculous. And all the other party guests — namely the ones from her mom’s side of the family, who have never really seemed to approve of her mom moving to the Cut to marry her dad when she was younger — are giving the boys major side-eyes. “I’m not playing beer pong with you, John B.”

“I’ll drink for you, babe!” JJ pipes up. “It’ll be fun!”

Kie laughs and takes a sip from the glass of punch Sarah hands her. _ Mmm, fruity.  _ And sadly, without alcohol. She’s never been much of a drinker, but it’s at times like these that Kie misses it. Maybe a splash of rum in her punch would help her get through this baby shower without dying of second-hand embarrassment. “Yeah, hard pass.”

“From me too,” Sarah agrees from beside her, leaning her hip against the counter and crossing her arms. 

“Eh, that’s no loss,” JJ stage whispers to John B. “Sarah’s not that good anyway.”

“Hey!” Sarah yelps.

“Watch it, buddy,” John B warns, chasing JJ around the table with a raised fist.

“You know I’m  _ almost _ one hundred percent kidding,” JJ laughs as he ducks a punch. “C’mon, Pope!” He calls while John B puts him in a headlock and playfully musses up his hair. “You can play, at  _ least.  _ Don’t be a pussy!”

There’s an offended gasp that echoes around the living room as some of Kie’s more traditional relatives balk at JJ’s choice of words. Pope turns to Kie and sighs like he’s fifty years older than he really is. “Murder’s still illegal, right?”

“Unfortunately,” Kie grins. “Go humour him. He’ll get bored in twenty.”

“I sure hope so.” With another exasperated sigh, Pope waves goodbye to the girls and heads off into the living room, a space which is quickly emptying of non-beer-pong-playing guests as the rest of the partygoers are put off by the ruckus the boys are making.

Kie sighs and leans against Sarah’s shoulder. They’re idiots. She loves them, but they’re idiots. 

After beer pong is presents. Loads and loads of presents. Kie feels bad every time she rips into some wrapping paper and opens up some brand new gift because she  _ still _ feels like this whole baby shower nonsense is just that:  _ nonsense.  _ But Sarah had stuck to her word and made sure that all the presents were gonna be environmentally-friendly and actually practical, and the coos of excitement and awe Sarah makes every time something new is unwrapped kind of makes it all worth it.

Besides, she does get gifted some cool stuff. There’s a bundle of secondhand baby books given to her by Miss Lana, plastic-free baby bottles from various relatives, a blanket from Pope (handmade by Sofia, apparently), hand-embroidered bibs made by her mom, and the cutest little booties Sarah and John B had picked up from a boutique store in Charleston. Sarah had promised that they were only the  _ first _ in what was going to be a long line of presents for the future Maybank-Carrera child. 

“I’m gonna be the fun aunt that spoils your kid rotten,” Sarah said with a determined look on her face as Kie had admired the woollen booties. “And you can’t do anything to stop me.”

The thing is, Kie doesn’t  _ want _ to stop Sarah from assuming that role. In fact, she loves the idea of she and JJ creating their own little family, surrounding themselves with friends who will become their child’s aunts and uncles. Pope, Sarah, John B. JJ and Kie have never been anything close to conventional. And with neither of them having siblings, friends as family will work perfectly. 

At some point towards the close of the shower. Kie and JJ end up in the upstairs hallway of her parents’ house, alone with her cousin Claire’s newborn baby. 

JJ and Kie had been talking in the hall, taking a quick break from chatting up all the party guests, when Claire had whizzed past, said, “I’ve really gotta pee, do you mind holding him for a sec?”, shoved the sleeping baby into JJ’s arms and zoomed off down to the bathroom.

“Shit!” JJ hisses as soon as Claire disappears, his eyes comically wide. “I don’t even know how to hold a baby, Kie!” He looks down at the sleeping little boy, cradling him awkwardly. Kie can feel the hot fear radiating from him. “How do I not know how to hold a baby? Why did none of those books tell me—”

“Here, you’re fine,” Kie interjects in a soothing voice, stepping closer towards him to help adjust his hold on the baby. “Just put your hand under his head and— yeah, you got it!”

“Okay. This is okay.” JJ looks more comfortable now, carefully holding the baby in his arms, no longer looking like he’s going to break out in a nervous sweat any moment. He looks down at the baby, making sure he’s still sound asleep. Kie just watches JJ, tears pricking at her eyes when she thinks  _ this is gonna be us soon.  _ “God, he’s so tiny,” JJ breathes, gently rocking the baby back and forth. Then, after a long moment of calm, the boy stirs in JJ’s arms and wrinkles his nose and mouth like he’s about to cry. “When do you think your cousin’s coming back?” JJ asks hurriedly, looking across at Kie with those big, nervous eyes again.

Kie runs a hand through JJ’s hair and drops her hand to rest on his shoulder, giving it a reassuring squeeze. “Like, two minutes, tops. You’re okay. You actually look...you look like you’re a natural.”

“I don’t fucking  _ feel _ like a natural.” He shakes his head. “I’m kind of freaked, Kie.”

“Really? You’re doing fine. He’s not even—”

“Not about holding your cousin’s kid, babe,” JJ sighs, not meeting her eyes. His ears turn red as he admits, “About the whole... _ dad _ thing.”

She would say something in her heart softens for him, but the truth is, that organ went completely mush when it comes to JJ a long time ago.“I know this,” she says. “I’m scared too. You know this. And it’s okay.”

He smiles, leans over and kisses her forehead. “Are we gonna be good parents?” he asks against her skin.

“What do you think?” she replies, tipping her chin up to look at him. 

“Yes.” Another kiss to her forehead. 

“Then we  _ will _ be. If we say we’re gonna be good parents, then we are. I promise.”

And the grin he gives her shines brighter than any star in those constellations Sarah had shown her summers ago.

“I can’t believe this is gonna be us in like, a month—“ he starts, but then the bathroom door is opening and Kie’s cousin is hurrying back down the hallway towards them. As soon as JJ spots her, his face lights up with relief. “Claire? Oh, thank God. Here, take him!” he says, holding the baby out in front of him.

Claire laughs, thanks them, coos over her soon and leaves for the living room. Kie turns to JJ and pulls him close, pressing a lingering kiss on his cheek. 

“You’re already a good dad,” she whispers. He relaxes against her and rubs a gentle palm over her belly.

He kisses her on her mouth and whispers back, “And you’re already the best mom.”

The shower wraps up in the late afternoon, but Kie, JJ and the other Pogues stick around for dinner with Kie’s parents upon insistence from Kie’s mom that it’s been too long since they were all together. No one leaves the house until late that night, after too much roast meat and eggnog.

Kie and JJ drive in silence on the way home. It’s one of those comfortable silences they’ve always been good at sitting in together: no need to explain how they’re feeling or what they’re thinking, just being with one another.

As they round the corner on the road they live on, she reaches for his hand and clasps her fingers around his wrist, gently tugging it towards her so his palm falls against her belly. His skin radiates warmth through her sweatshirt. She feels that heat inside her heart, too.

JJ rubs his thumb in soft circles against the fabric of her shirt. As he does so, the baby turns a somersault in Kie’s belly, kicking against JJ’s hand. He twitches, inhales sharply, says, “Oh my God, did you feel that?”

“Yes, JJ,” Kie chuckles. “Gremlin’s wriggly today. It’s yours, for sure.”

JJ snorts a laugh. “Yeah. Right.”

She squeezes his wrist and his thumb smooths once again over her skin. Kie closes her eyes. Moonlight trickles through the trees as they drive past them, caressing her face with slivers of cool silver.

She thinks of John B and Sarah, the image of them all cosied up together on the couch at her parents’ house, happy in each other’s love. 

She thinks of Pope, always so consistently loyal, joining with JJ in the beer pong game not because he’d really wanted to, but because he’d do anything to keep his best friend happy and having fun.

She thinks of her parents and the looks on their faces as they’d sat around this afternoon and opened baby gifts, like they were proud of her for once in her goddamn life.

She thinks of this baby, squirming inside her belly, changing day by day. There’s a familiar fear that accompanies that thought, one JJ had expressed today and one that has been echoing in her head since day one:  _ will she be enough? For the baby? For JJ? Can she be a good mom?  _

But that fear, that anxiety, is mostly quelled when she thinks of the boy next to her: of his trademark cheeky smirk, his quick wit, his bleeding heart. 

They’ll be okay. She knows it.

* * *

Christmas comes in a rush, having crept up on JJ and Kie so fast while they’d been distracted with baby-related things. They’ve both barely bought any gifts, and hadn’t organised anything in the way of some kind of Christmas dinner.

Thankfully, Kie’s parents have them sorted, telling the two of them to just show up sometime on Christmas morning, prepared to eat a fuckload of food.

(Well, okay, maybe they hadn’t said  _ fuckload _ when Kie’s mom had called her that morning, but based on what they’d had for dinner the night of the baby shower and at Thanksgiving, JJ’s expecting to be practically rolling out of the Carrera’s house come late Christmas night.)

JJ wakes up Christmas morning with Kie snoring into his shoulder and his nose filled with coconut-shampoo-scented curly hair. He lies awake for a few minutes while he waits for her to stir on her own, tracing his fingers down the side of her arm, the one that draped over his chest. Her belly is pressed to his side, round and warm and huge, and he thinks briefly that this is their first Christmas together, and their only one before the baby is born. Next Christmas they’ll have a one-year-old on their hands. 

And isn’t that a thought and a half.

Kie yawns and blinks awake before JJ can delve any deeper into his mega-sappy daydreams about the future. 

“Mornin’,” he says, pressing a light kiss to her nose.

She squirms in his arms, blinks up at him, smiles sleepily and whispers, “Merry Christmas.”

And that  _ smile.  _ All for him. He’ll never get sick of it.

Only a couple minutes into the day, and JJ just knows that this will be his best Christmas yet.

The two of them eat a quick breakfast and unwrap the gifts they’d gotten each other (the only presents they’d managed to buy). Kie gets a set of new fins for her surfboard, ready to be put to use as soon as she’s cleared for physical activity after the baby’s birth. JJ gets a new sweater — after Kie had complained that he’d worn out his Kildare County High one too much — and a pair of sandals with beer bottle openers attached to the soles.  _ Practical and stylish,  _ he’d called them when they’d found them in one of the local surf shops. Kie had rolled her eyes and called them ugly, but had obviously snuck behind his back and bought them anyway, a fact that makes him grin.

After presents, they dress up in their best festive gear. This, for Kie, includes the ugliest Christmas sweater either of them have ever seen, one she’s been forced to wear on account of that fact that her grandmother had gifted it to her at the baby shower. Why on earth this elderly woman had thought a Christmas sweater was an appropriate gift for a baby shower, JJ will never know. But he’s not complaining. Teasing Kie about the giant glittery bow on her belly is too much fun. Plus, she still looks cute.

The Carrera household smells like heaven when they arrive. Like with Thanksgiving, JJ’s never really had a proper Christmas dinner. He likes that all these firsts are happening with Kie. It makes it feel like they really are their own little family.

Sarah and John B join them for lunch, and Pope and Sofie pop in later in the afternoon for leftover turkey and present openings. There’s a ton of gifts for baby Gremlin — more for anyone else in attendance. JJ reckons his kid’s the most spoiled of any, and they haven’t even been born yet.

The evening passes in a blur of mulled wine and laughter, and by the time JJ and Kie eventually make their way home, JJ’s almost halfway drunk, giggly and clumsy as Kie leads him through the front door of the Chateau. 

“Knew I shouldn’t have let you have that fourth glass,” Kie grumbles as she forces JJ to chug some water in the kitchen. 

He grins around the mouth of the glass. “You love it.” There’s something else contributing to his giddiness, though. Something he can’t quite put into words.

Maybe it’s the overwhelming feeling of being wanted for once. Of being welcomed into a home, into a family. Loving and being loved in return, without strings, without conditions. 

He gets it, now. Gets why the holidays are big deals for people. He’d never understood it before, really, because his dad hated the holiday season. Luke called it a waste of time and money, especially when JJ was too much of a bad kid to be worth spending good cash on presents for. 

But after today, he gets it. He really does. The holidays are about family. About being together, getting all hopeful for the future and the year that’s coming. JJ certainly felt that when he was sitting around the fire with his friends tonight, felt the warmth in the room that hadn’t come from a fire.

He doesn’t know how to put this into words that won’t sound stupid, so he leans in to kiss Kie instead, hoping that the heat of his mouth on hers gives away all of the hope and love and joy that’s been brimming inside him all goddamn day.

(The way she kisses him back makes him think she understands.)

Sarah and John B get home, and the four of them pitch in to make up the couch bed, seeing as their old bedroom is now JJ and Kie’s and the study has been transformed into a baby room. JJ’s more useful after a few more glasses of water. John B, who had twice as much Christmas-themed alcohol tonight, is not so much. After a good five minutes of watching him trying and failing to tuck in the corner sheet, Sarah rolls her eyes and takes over. John B falls back on one of the armchairs with a giggle, which makes JJ laugh too.

“I’ll look after the idiot who can’t handle his booze,” Sarah says as she fluffs up some pillows. “You guys go to bed.”

And, well, she doesn’t have to tell JJ twice.

JJ and Kie’s daily nighttime routine is no different on this Christmas night. They shower together, JJ rubs cocoa butter all over Kie’s belly, they brush their teeth together, pulling funny faces and giggling at each other in the mirror. And then, when the lights are off and the curtains drawn, there’s always the little moments of pillow talk between them before they inevitably get too tired to keep up conversation and fall asleep.

“That was a good Christmas,” Kie says with a happy sigh as she snuggles into his chest, all soft and smelling like sugar. 

“Uh huh. The best.” He wonders if she can sense how wide he’s smiling, even in the dark.

“I love you,” she says softly, and he’s pretty sure there will never come a day where he doesn’t get all mushy hearing those words. 

“Mmm.” He presses a light kiss to her forehead. “Love you too.”

There’s a few beats of silence, and JJ closes his eyes, thinking that she’s probably drifted off to sleep already. But then she’s pushing herself up on one elbow, brushing the hair out of his eyes, and asking, “When?”

Without even asking her to clarify, JJ knows what she means.  _ When did you know you loved me?  _ “The first time you kissed me,” he says with finality.

Even in the moonlight, he can see her pretty nose crinkle in confusion. “You mean last Thanksgiving?”

“No. Before.”

“You’ve had a crush on me since we were fourteen?” She grins. “That’s cute, Maybank.”

“Shut up,” he chuckles, tugging her closer so she falls down back into his chest. “You?”

“I think I’m the same.” He swears he can feel her blush warming the skin on his chest, and smiles because of it.

“Now who’s the dork?”

“Stop it.”

He grins and kisses her hair. “So you’ve been crushin’ on me off and on since ninth grade, huh?”

“Mmhmm. I guess so.”

“But when did you...you know... _ know? _ ” He doesn’t know why it feels so important to ask this right now. They’ve talked about this a lot: what they mean to each other, how much they love each other. Why does it matter when it all started for her? Or for him, for that matter? Is it not enough that they love each other  _ now? _

Maybe it’s the lingering buzz of the mulled wine making him soppy, or that feeling he had at the Carrera’s of being wanted and loved making him want to be all poetic and shit, but he wants to know. When she knew. 

“That I loved you?” He nods, even though she probably can’t see him in the dark. He feels her turn onto her back, and they both stare up at the ceiling. There’s a long silence that stretches between them, so quiet he can hear the murmurs of Sarah and John B talking in the living room, the sounds of cars driving in the distance. Can almost hear her mind working, thinking, figuring out what to say. Is she replaying the past year with him in her head, trying to pinpoint the time she knew she loved him, just as he is? 

When Kie speaks again, it’s with a voice so soft and tender he almost feels like crying. (Fuck, he’s  _ never  _ having mulled wine again if it makes him feel as sappy as this.) “The minute— no, the  _ second _ — I left you. As soon as I got in the car and saw you in the rearview mirror, standing on the doorstep...I knew I was—“ she sighs and reaches across to grab his hand, intertwining her fingers with his. “You know, it had been building up for a long time. Like, a  _ long,  _ long time. But that was the moment I really knew that I was completely, stupidly in love with you. I was so scared that I’d fucked it up for good.”

“You didn’t, though,” he says, unable to help the grin that spreads across his face at the memory of her showing up on his doorstep at Thanksgiving. 

“I didn’t.” The sheets rustle as she turns to him again, their interlocked hands resting on his chest. “Anyway, what about you?”

The answer to this one’s simple. Something he’s thought about a lot. The words roll off his tongue as sweet and easy as honey. “I think I realised we were gonna be something the moment you told me you were pregnant. Like, I just  _ knew _ that things were gonna change. And it was surprising because...I liked the idea of it, even though it scared me. And then when you came to me after you told your parents about the baby...that’s when I knew for sure. Almost told you, right in the middle of—”

“I remember,” she interjects, and he thinks she’s probably blushing again, soft brown skin lighting up with a tinge of pink. Is she thinking of that night too? When he’d had her in his arms, been inside her, and almost said those three words? “I told you not to say it if you didn’t mean it.”

“I did mean it, you know. I wasn’t just saying it for no reason.”

“I know that now.”

He laughs despite himself. “We’re a mess.”

“Oh, we’re a hot mess for sure,” Kie chuckles. Then she’s kissing him on the mouth, sweet and soft and warm, and he’s pretty sure he never wants this moment to end. “Merry Christmas, baby daddy.”

“Merry Christmas, mama. I love you.” 

“Love you too.”

It’s another hour before he falls asleep, long after Kie drifts off into dreamland. He’s not wide awake because his mind is filled with worries, or because he’s feeling restless, but because he can’t stop looking at her. Watching her. Admiring her. Like he always is.

His girl. His Kiara. His curly-haired, golden-skinned, saltwater princess. His best friend. The love of his goddamn life.

Three weeks to go until the baby’s born. He remembers this, and the usual feeling of fear and excitement floods his body, accompanied by all those questions he still seems to have:  _ Is he gonna be a good dad? Can he take care of Kie? _

Kie sighs and stirs in her sleep, cuddling closer to him, her nose in the crook of his shoulder. Everything but her melts away. 

As long as he’s got his girl by his side, everything will turn out just fine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yes i got all super mushy at the end there. i’m in my FEELINGS about them okay!!!!!!
> 
> also i just realised i end most of my soft chapters with them in bed together lol. but isn’t that the most intimate, romantic thing there is: sleeping together in the non-sexual sense?? UGh!
> 
> anywho — a very happy belated holidays to all you lovely readers 💗 hoping and praying 2021 will be better for all of us!
> 
> (once again, thank you to my wonderful beta shannon for reading this over for me!!)

**Author's Note:**

> come cry with me on tumblr @jjmaybank. also i love to give out spoilers so if you're sick of waiting for the next chapter dm/send me an ask and i can throw some stuff your way.....
> 
> love u all thank u for reading this and sending me loads of love through comments & kudos. you're all the best readers ever!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [your love is more, than worth it’s weight in gold](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25966276) by [interstellarbeams](https://archiveofourown.org/users/interstellarbeams/pseuds/interstellarbeams)
  * [you taught me what a life is for](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26911855) by [interstellarbeams](https://archiveofourown.org/users/interstellarbeams/pseuds/interstellarbeams)




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